


Go West

by lesbianferrissbueller



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Billy being a good brother for once, Bisexual Steve Harrington, Blow Jobs, Bonding, Bottom Steve Harrington, California, Canon-Typical Behavior, Coming Out, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Sex, Eventual Smut, Exes, First Time, Found Family, Gay Bar, Gay Billy Hargrove, Homophobic Language, Hotel Sex, Hurt/Comfort, I mean its pretty vanilla, I refuse to say the f-slur unless I absolutely have to, Internalized Homophobia, It's about being ok again after not being ok for a long time, Its all in chapter 8, Las Vegas, Lesbian Robin Buckley, M/M, Mutual Pining, Nancy Wheeler is period-typical horrible, Outing, Past Steve Harrington/Nancy Wheeler, Post-Season/Series 03, Power Bottom Steve Harrington, Reconciliation, Riding, Road Trips, Robin Buckley & Steve Harrington Friendship, Scars, Smut, Tenderness, They go to the beach, Top Billy Hargrove, Touch-Starved, Yearning, and non-extreme words, but its tender, so skip to that if you want
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2020-10-17 12:31:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 58,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20621075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianferrissbueller/pseuds/lesbianferrissbueller
Summary: Billy died. Somehow he's alive now, but according to Max he was dead for a solid couple of minutes. He gets memories of July back in bits and pieces. He spends a month at the hospital trying to be whole again. He isn't. Then El visits him and tell him the only thing she's sure will help: "Go to the beach."With an almost manic determination, Billy decides to get him and Max as far away from Hawkins as possible, to get them back to California. But he doesn't have a car anymore...Steve has had his heart broken before. He still wasn't prepared for Billy to rip him a new one and break it all off the last week of June. They'd been sneaking around together for months, Steve thought maybe he was in love. Steve had felt like a real person again. Then it was over. Then Billy died. Somehow he's alive now. When he finally works up the courage to visit Billy in the hospital, thanks to Robin, Billy tells him he's taking Max and going west. He just doesn't have a car...Steve could drive them.-ROAD TRIP! Steve drives Billy and Max to Cali. Robin goes with in the name of homosexuality. Billy and Robin become friends. Max and Robin try to get the boys back together





	1. Before

**Author's Note:**

> IMPORTANT: hey if ur Reading this this is lesbianferris of the future here to say I don’t exactly Love this work it was One of my first and I regularly consider deleting it so please proceed with that in mind hope u have a good day <3
> 
> HEY KIDS this is like an unofficial sequel to a fic I wrote previously, I Wanna Be Adored ( https://archiveofourown.org/works/20147611/chapters/47732044 ) but both are stand alone fics. This one is probably gong to be better because I'm in the swing of things now but feel free to read both!  
Listened to a lot of 70s/80s shitty radio hits for this, hope y'all enjoy.  
All my love,  
Gogo
> 
> https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1EcNvyLJMxl6xuWgulIFSk?si=ZHwDfHibQmW6nH3XySEFKQ  
Spotify playlist!

No couple has enough time. Enough time to talk, to laugh, to cry, to have sex, to go for aimlessly long drives, to bring one another gifts, to just exists in the other’s circut. 

Steve had thought they’d have more time than that, though. 

On June 29th, Steve and Billy had the loudest most vicious fight of their entire relationship. It was horrible. Steve walked home, slammed Billy’s car door. Billy even yelled after him. 

They’d fought before. One or both of them would do some dumb shit thing and the other would get pissed off and theyd have to talk through it. Talking was more often than not also yelling, but it never worried either of them. One or both would always apologise. Because they were so much better together, better then being apart, better than being alone. 

This fight was different.

This fight was vague and cruel and hurt more. Steve felt heavier, weighed down as he walked home. Colder.

He called Billy when he got home. Max picked up. She told him Billy wasn't home, and why was he calling the landline anyway? What if their parents had been home?

“It’s important.” 

He called again later. 

And again. 

And the next day.

And the next.

But Billy was out again. Or busy. 

He went to Billy’s house out of exasperation. Desperation, too, maybe. No one answered. 

Finally, he saw Billy downtown a few days later. He called out to him, try to catch his gaze.

He did.

Billy’s eyes slid over Steve, as if he’d never seen him before in his life. 

Steve realized it wasn't just a fight.

That was it. Over.

But that wasn't when Steve felt his heart break.

Steve had it rapidly and vaguely explained to him that Billy had been possessed. He was still groggy from whatever happy-time cocktail the Russians had given them. He felt his stomach turn, he wanted, needed to do something, but he’d been here before, and more than anything he had to keep himself and Robin and the kids alive. The thing revving the engine of Billy’s car wearing Billy’s skin wasn't him. Steve shut everything out and slammed a foot down on the pedal of the conveniently-there convertible. It wouldn't kill him, he told himself. It wouldn't kill him. 

It might have, though. 

But that wasn't when Steve felt his heart break.

That was right in this moment, as Steve’s head pounded and sirens got closer outside the mall, as El held Max back from Billy’s body, as Robin said Steve’s name over and over and he didn't know how to respond.

That was when his heart broke. 

_ “Steve!” _

-

Before senior year was even over, Billy made Max a promise. 

They were a team by then. 

He had to respect her for tranq-ing him. He didn’t apologize for anything, really, he just tried to do less that needed apologising about. He tried to make nice, but for real. She responded, which surprised him at first, but he remembered being around 14, just before the rest of any sort of shine he'd had in him left. If someone had been nice to him back then, he might have let them. He might have been more ok. Max was getting more and more ok. 

They were sneaking ice cream from the freezer in the middle of a hot June night when Max leaned her head on his shoulder and whispered 

“I hate it here sometimes.”

Billy had said that out loud to anyone that would listen a million times, but it was different to hear Max say it now. She had friends in Hawkins, she had more of a life than Billy did, even. 

“Like, this town?”

“No.” She shook her head. “This house. I fucking hate this house.”

“Yeah,” Billy sighed. “Me too.”

They could hear crickets from outside. 

It was better with Max, it was better with Steve.

And suddenly everything got so much worse. 

Billy was surprised his dad didn’t kill him. He might have tried. 

He didn't need to be told what Billy was apparently, he could tell. 

Billy didn’t go to Steve after getting the shit beat out of him this time. 

He couldn't.

He was supposed to end the only thing that had made him happy in years.

Billy would never cheat on Steve. Never in a million years, he would never forgive himself if he did. Which is why he basically broke it off in the car that day. Not because he wanted to cheat, because he had to. He told himself that over and over and usually the voice was quiet but this one was loud. 

_ Be normal. _

He picked a fight, he made it hurt worse. He couldn't keep seeing Steve, for so many conflicting reasons and they’d fought before, but this was different. 

Pick a woman, any woman. Be normal. Pick normal. 

Sleeping with Mrs. Wheeler seemed like an obvious fix. 

_ Right? _

How stupid could he have been?

-

Steve could have told Robin about Billy in that bathroom. Or at least about part of it. He could have lead with the “oh, man, I get it.” But he was kind of surprised. He was hoping she could be the rebound. The uncomplicated sort of romance that just made you happy and nothing else. Not the big soul crushing brain devouring passionate insane beautiful glorious wonderful kind of thing he’d felt with Billy. 

It could just be nice with Robin. He’d started thinking about it over the few days they really got to know each other, fighting for their lives. They could hold hands in public. They could catch a movie, meet each others parents, split a milkshake. He could be her date to prom. And it didn't have to be a big secret. It didn't have to loom just around the corner that they’d be caught and everything in his life would come crashing down. If anyone saw them making out in Steve’s car they’d ignore it or laugh- kids will be kids. 

They wouldn't have to sneak around.    
They’d get to just be. 

Why would anyone even want that sneaking around and constant danger of being exposed for being a total fruitcake and getting beat up or worse if you did?

_ Because it was worth it.  _

It was worth it to know who you were, finally. To get to share that with someone else. 

For the couple of seconds where Robin waitied, trying not to cry, for Steve to say something about her, about what she’d said, about Tammy Thompson, Steve thought in part that wasn't it just perfect that of course, the one girl he’d thought he could get past this with was like him. Because he did actually like girls. 

So did she.

He wanted that to be hers. 

She knew who she was. 

She’d shared that with him. 

He gave her the moment. 

-

When Billy first woke up in the hospital, the only thing he really registered was Max asleep next to him. He didn't get much else. 

Just her, breathing, one hand in his. 

Then he was out again. 

When he really actually woke up a few hours later, Max was staring at him. 

“Hey, kid.” He managed. Everything hurt. 

She started crying. Hitching, hiccupy sobs and fell forward across his chest. That hurt even more, but he didn't tell her that. She looked terrible, hair unbrushed, dark circles under her eyes, fewer freckles than before. 

_ Before. _

Billy was in the hospital for a little over a month. He spent every week trying to think of a way to remember everything that didn't feel like it would break him down into too small of pieces to put back together. 

There were huge gaps. Gaps he was told he’d never get back. Maybe that was a good thing. He remembered a couple things. 

Driving home, obviously. 

Work after that, a little.

Cold metal. 

Cold water. 

Cold everything. 

Heather with empty eyes. 

Something like a pulse.

Steve calling his name. 

The sauna. 

Max crying. 

His mom. 

He was alone, when he remembered what he’d seen of his mom. Probably why he let himself cry about it. 

Not a lot, mostly because a lot would have made his chest hurt more. Fuck, his chest hurt. Breathing was hard, raising his arms was hard, everything was like moving through syrup or mud. 

Max never left his side, he found out. She had thought he was dead, and god that must have been horrible. 

Everything was so much better for them, they had been getting along. More than getting along, they’d been like a team, just before those four days. They’d started looking out for each other, working together. He’d actually let himself care about her. And almost no one else. 

Except for Steve.

But Max had completely broken down, she told him that. 

She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what to do without him. Nowhere felt safe, nowhere felt secure. 

She was wearing his jacket. 

The jean one, not so beat up. 

It was a million sizes too big, even after all the times she’d cuffed the sleeves, but she never took it off, not even after he woke up

She got it the one and only time she’d been home in the past week. They all thought he was dead, but still, Max made the EMT’s drag his body out of Starcourt Mall. 

One of them found a pulse. 

Lucas found out first, weirdly. He was the one closest, El had pulled Max aside, tried to comfort her in any way she could. El was all too familiar with death. 

One of the EMTs grabbed lucas, told him they’d found a pulse and were rushing to the hospital, tell anyone who should know. Family? Friends?

Most of them were headed to the hospital anyway. 

Turns out even after being discharged, most everyone stayed in the waiting room, together or in shifts to see if Billy was going to make it. This kind of surprised Billy, because wasn't he the bad guy?

No, of course not, Max hugged him tighter. 

“I was kidding.”

“I don’t care.”

It was unclear whether or not the party was there for Billy or for Max. Both, maybe. 

So everyone was outside, everyone was in and out for weeks getting follow ups on broken bones and concussions. 

Steve was the third most damaged, Billy found out, and wanted to see him. 

“Where is he?”

Max bit her lip. “I don’t know.”

Where was Steve? Was he ok? Why hadn't he come by? Was he avoiding Billy?

“Didn’t you guys break up?” Max whispered.

That hurt more than anything else, really. More than his chest or his head or his various broken bones and cuts deep enough for stitches.

Billy had his 18th birthday in the hospital. He was ‘under observation.’ He could walk again by then, but not for particularly long periods of time. He didn't like being in the starched white hospital bed, though, so most of the time he sat on the floor and played solitaire, or listened to the radio. 

He got his personal effects back when they determined he’d be there long term. It was weird to put his pendant back on though. It hung right over the center of the soon-to-be scar on his chest. It was too much sensation over the pink and red and bruised and stitched skin. It was too cold or too hot or too heavy. But he didn't take it off. It sort of focused him, one specific place where pain came from rather than all over. 

He stared at his driver’s license for a while. He was only sixteen when the picture was taken. 

He wouldn't wish to go back. But he might wish to just not be here. 

Shouldn't he have died?

There was no way a person could survive, well, whatever the fuck had happened. 

And he had.

_ You’d be better off dead.  _

Don’t think that.

He usually hated his birthday. He usually got $20 and a pat on the shoulder and was forced to endure a sit down dinner with his family which was always hell on ice. 

But this birthday was different. Not good. Just weird.

He got cards. Max told her friends. They made him cards. It was really fucking wierd.

_ Billy, _

_ Thanks for not killing us. Hope you’re not still made about me dating your sister. She’s really cool. Happy birthday. _

_ -Lucas S. _

Billy was admittedly less mad about Lucas and Max being a thing. She seemed less pissed off at the world when she spent time with him. 

_ Hi Billy, _

_ I know it sucks now, but I’ve been where you are, and I promise it gets better. You’ll be ok. Happy Birthday! _

_ Sincerely,  _

_ Will Byers _

That was the other kid Max had told him about. Apparently this had happened before in this hellscape town, just on a smaller scale.

_ Billy, _

_ Glad you're alive. _

_ Mike Wheeler _

What a little shit.

_ Hey Billy! _

_ I know you might still hate us a little but Max really cares about you so we do too! Really glad you’re alive buddy, hope you’re doing ok. Many happy returns. _

_ _ \- Dustin Henderson, Esq. _ _

Billy had actually met Dustin a few times. Steve basically adopted the kid. He was probably nice, and probably meant what he said, but thinking about Dutin made Billy think about Steve, and thinking about Steve sucked. 

_ Billy, _

_ You don’t know who I am but my name’s Robin Buckely. I’m a friend of Steve’s. I’m glad you survived, I’ve heard a lot about you. Good and bad. I hope you’re ok at least. _

_ Happy Birthday. _

_ Robin _

_ P.S. Steve’s glad you survived, too.  _

Robin. Didn’t ring a bell.

_ Hey loser, _

_ Happy Birthday. Thanks for not dying, that was cool.  _

_ Love you,  _

_ Max _

He smiled at that one.

_ Billy, _

_ Happy birthday. Don’t know what else to write. _

_ Steve _

Billy might have been flooded with different feelings reading that. Anger, most primarily. Anger that Steve wouldnt see him, wouldnt even write something more than a stupid fucking ‘happy birthday’, hadnt rushed to his side or whatever people who were in love were supposed to do. 

But they might not be in love anymore. 

Billy had made sure of that. 

And Steve didn’t owe him anything. 

So really he was just sad. 

Sad and empty and alone.

  
  


El didn’t write him a birthday card because she wanted to talk to him, Max explained. 

Why did she want to talk to him?

She just did. She thought it might help. 

Billy tried to remember El. He could picture her. He felt kind of a weird mix of fear and anger. But it wasn't his. Like he’d just heard someone talk about fear and anger over and over and over and seen El. 

But Max left, and El came in.

She looked older than 14. She looked… immortal. And haggard as hell.

She made everything quieter. 

The door clicked shut behind her.

“Hi, Billy.” El said in no particular way.

“Hey.” He said back. 

She stood just in front of the doorway, unmoving for a few moments.

“How are you?” she asked. She spoke kind of funny, slower, more deliberate, like english wasn't her first language. 

He hesitated. “I’m ok.”

“That’s good.” She said it like she wanted him to be ok.

“Why… why are you here?” Billy furrowed his brow. 

“To see you.” She shrugged. 

“Aren’t you… scared?”

“No.” She shook her head. 

“Why not?”

“Gate’s closed.”

He had no idea what that meant. He didn’t ask.

“You.. you threw me into a wall.” He remembered it as he said it. 

“I had to.”

“Yeah…” He tried to think about the way the floor felt flat against his hands. “I guess you did.”

She paused.

“I came to say,” She searched for words. “You should go to the beach.”

“What?” 

“The beach. You should go back. I think… it would help.”

He stared at her. She set a hand on his shoulder. He might have pulled back. He didn't.

“It’s going to be ok.” She said, almost.... determined?

Then she started walking back to the door.

“El?”

She turned over her shoulder to look at him.

“I’m sorry.”   
She smiled. “Not your fault.”

The door clicked shut behind her.

The room settled.

Max had to go home sometimes. Billy was alone more and more before being discharged. He didn't know how he’d expected to be, you couldn't just prepare for a thing like this. But he wasn't angry. He wasn't particularly anything. He just felt… depleted. Left adrift without fuel. He barely ate. He made every nurs ethan check in with him crank up the heat in the room. He hoarded blankets. When he could walk around he would just pace, feel his bare feet on the warm linoleum. He desperately wanted to take a shower, but couldn't even do that until everything healed more. 

He didn't really know how he felt about anything. He had nothing to do. 

Max played card with him, told him how everyone else was, tried to crack jokes, tried to make things seem normal. 

Things were not normal. Thing might never be normal again. 

He couldnt go home, that was for fucking sure. 

The part of him fighting to be alive wouldn't allow it. 

Becuase since talking to El, a small part of him was fighting. To be alive, to thrive. 

_ “Go to the beach.” _

Go west.

Go home. 

That was all he thought about for a week.

“Max.”

“Hm?”

“Do you still want to go home?” Billy asked her across his hospital bed.

“Home like, the house?” She cut the deck of cards between them

Billy took a deep breath. “Home, like, California.”

She looked up. 

Billy felt, a least a little, alive again.

-

Steve felt like shit for not going to see Billy. Part of it was he himself spent a few days in the hospital most of it talking to El while her leg healed, and Dustin, Robin and Erica because they refused to leave.

“Guys, seriously, I’m fine.”

“You might have brain damage!” Dustin reiterated.

“That’ll make you even more stupid than you were before. That’s dangerous amouts of stupid.” Erica folded her arms. 

“Also we love you.” Robin patted his arm, less awkward than the last time she’d done it. 

“Love is a strong word, sweetheart.” Erica turned to stick out a hand.

“We have strong feelings about Steve.” 

Robin was a bit of a wreck too, and 

He didnt really want anyen to know that it had gotten worse, but between the drugs and the torture, his paranoia and anxiety and every-fucking-thing else was piling up.

They had to drug him again to get hi to sleep, which was not great, but better than trying to his a record of 49 hours without so much as closing his eyes. He was reluctant to give up his bat, aksing Dustin to hide it somewhere safe, which turned out to just be under his bed.

He woke up with this sort of horribly buling terror in his chest sometimes. Like he was in danger again, like they all were, even in broad daylight with no one but him and Robin in the room. He didn't tell anyone about it, trying to deal on his own, but Robin noticed something was up. She didn't say anything about it really, Steve wasn't sure he could describe it, but her just being there helped. She stayed around most nights. They told all the staff Robin was his girlfriend. Dustin found out second hand.

“Are you and Robin actually-”

“ _ No _ .” 

It caught on to the point that Nancy met Robin and did her sort of bad-awkward small talk until she could find an excuse to leave.

“Wish you’d been my beard last year.” Robin laughed, sipping hospital-grade orange juice beside him. “I would have been so much more popular.”

“Your what?’ Steve asked.

“My beard. It’s the word for when a gay person has a fake significant other to play it safe.”

“Oh. Makes sense but why beard?”

“Usually for gay men with fake grilfiends.”

“Gotcha.”

Everytime they were alone, Robin would tell him more facts about just like, gays in general. It was wildly interesting, and at one point had Steve wondering why he aksed her so many questions about it, but he knew. 

And he still hadn't told her. 

She started sleeping over at his house a lot, sneaking out of her own which reminded him (painfully) of Billy doing the same thing so many times over when they were together. 

Billy wasn't dead. And he was himself again. And Steve should be thrilled, should have sprinted into his room with a dozen roses as soon as he came around. He just... didn't. 

He just sort of stewed in his own confusion for a couple of weeks. 

Robin was over, sneaking swigs of a bottle peach schnapps she’d taken from her mom, laying upside down in Steve’s bed rambling about why she thought Marie Antointte was bi when Steve knew he had to say something.

“Robin?”

“Yeah?” she stacked her feet on his headboard. Billy used to do that when he was up here. 

Steve steeled himself. “I have to tell you something.”

“Sure.” She flipped over onto her stomach. “What’s up?”

  
  
  



	2. Not Ideal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ook this too forever but believe me there's 60 more doc pages so imma keep going. This fic is my baby now.  
All my love,  
Gogo

Robin was momentarily shocked when she found out Steve wasn't straight. Then she wasn’t shocked at all. Because, like, that checked out. Steve with his perfect hair and overdone under-rehearsed charm. The way he felt things so sincerely. Of course there was something there. She actually thought that’s what he was leading up to, saying he had to tell her something. Then she wrote it off as her tendancy to think anyone could be gay. 

Then she was right.

“What’s up?” She had flipped onto her stomach.

Steve sat down on the bed next to her, sticking his feet out so he could swing them back and forth. 

“Do you remember,” He lifted his head, not really looking at her. “When we were under the mall, and you said you felt like your life was one big error?”

“Yeah,” She twisted her mouth a little, thinking.

“I get that. Sometimes.”

“Sure, but,” She sat up more. “Steve, you know I said that about like, not being straight.”

He fell back on the bed and laughed a little. “Yeah.”

Robin stared at him, watched him take an unsteady breath. 

That made so much sense. 

And no sense at all. 

“You… you’re… You too?”

Steve put an arm over his eyes, at a loss maybe.

“But why didn't you tell me! And all those girls you tired to pick up- And you’re so popular!”   
“Was so popular,” He corrected. “Not anymore.”

“Why didn't you tell me?” Robin was almost a little pissed.

“We didn’t have time. And I wanted to, I dunno, give you the moment. It’s tough shit.”

“Yeah,” Robin would have laughed out loud. “Yeah, it really is. This makes so much sense.”

“Is it obvious?” Steve grimaced. 

“No! Well, yes. But no. It’s obvious now that I like, think about it. But I doubt anyone else could tell you’re… Wait, do you even actually like girls?”

“Yes. So much, dude, god.”

“I get that.” Robin smiled a little. “But like, also guys?”

Steve groaned in response, digging the heels of his palm into his eyes, exasperated.

“Did you actually like me?”

“Dunno. A little, at least. It’s easy to like you.”

Robin sat up a little more. “Why are you telling me now?”

Steve shrugged. Then smiled, then looked so sad his heart might have been breaking.

“Steve, what’s wrong?”

“You know Billy Hargrove?” Steve sat back up.

“The kid who got possessed. And Max’s brother? Right? She’s the redhead.”

“Yep.”

Robin took longer to get there then she should have. The smile wiped clean off her face. She met Steve’s eyes, she might have cried looking at him.

“Oh… Steve.” She put her hands on his shoulders. “Was he… did you…?”

Steve pulled a hand through his hair, clearly trying to keep it together.

“Did you like him? Dustin said you guys were like mortal enemies and- and then friends. Were you… together?”

“I am so stupid.” 

“No,” Robin sat up on her knees. “No, you’re not stupid. You’re a dingus and a half but you’re not stupid, I promise.”

Robin hugged him. As tight as she could. Somehow, this was a relief. It explained why Steve asked so many questions about all the gay history she knew. It explained why he was so easy to accept her. And if anything, it made her less alone. He knew how she felt. Exactly, ho she felt. 

“We were together, I guess. I don’t know.” Robin could feel Steve’s chest hum as he spoke. “What counts as that, you know?”

“Yeah.”

Robin settled against Steve’s chest. She figured he might want contact like that. The more cuddly side of platonic. 

“For how long?” She asked gently. 

“Couple of months. We were hooking up for a while before that. It… it was nice. It was weird, but really good, too.”

“Yeah.” Robin pulled back a little. “Why aren't you there now? With him, at the hospital?”

She had a guess. She was right. She didn't want to be, this time.

“He broke it off. Couple weeks ago.”

“Why?”

“I think his dad found out, maybe. His dad’s a pice of shit. I’d probably hit him with my bat if I got the chance.”

Robin laughed a little at that.

“That’s really fucked up, Steve. The whole situation” Robin told him, because maybe he needed to hear that. 

“It’s not ideal.”

He was always funny. Even when they thought they were gonna die. Even when she told him her big dark secret. 

Even when he told her his.

“Tell me about him.” Robin said finally. 

“What?”

“Tell me. About Billy.”

Steve did. Like he’d been waiting for someone to tell. Like she’d told him about Tammy.

How much of a dick Billy was. And how sweet. What kinds of music he liked, what kinds he hated. How he’d been banned from the 7Eleven by the high school for shoplifting booze one too many times. How he’d beaten the shit out of Steve at the beginning of last year, and how many times he’d tried to make up for it. 

How Steve thought maybe he was in love.

Robin was almost heartbroken on Steve’s behalf. 

Steve said Billy’s birthday was in a few days. Billy hated his birthday.

Robin wrote him a card.

-

Billy had felt empty and tired for four weeks. Now, just as he coudl start getting sitiches out, just as he stopped needing that stupid saline drip, just as they had downed the number of painkillers he had to take on a daily basis, he felt a little alive again.

Not totally, not fully, but he felt like maybe he could get there. If only he could get out of Hawkins.

His dad pretty much ignored his birthday. This one might have been special in any other family, 18, they should do something special. His dad probably took it as an excuse to ignore it. Billy was an adult. He was responsible for himself. 

Billy wondered how soon he would have gotten kicked out if had been planning to stay. 

Which is why he was especially shocked when Max’s mom came to see him. Like, his doormat stepmom who didn’t speak unless spoken to. 

Susan Hargrove.

Max, taking on the roll of Billy’s unofficial bodyguard/receptionist, let her in.

She looked aggravatingly normal. 

“Hi Billy,” Susan shifted her purse higher on shoulder. Her hair lost any red quality it might have shared with Max’s in the fluorescent lights.

“Did my dad send you?” Billy kept his face expressionless.

“No,” Susan looked down. “He doesn’t know I’m here.”

Max pulled her knees up to her chest, perched on the end of Billy’s bed. She looked between them, settling on Billy.

“Why are you here, then?” He asked.

“Just to see how you’re holding up. Max told me a bit about the fire at the mall.”

Billy nodded a couple of times. “Yeah, the fire.”

“I was just… worried.”

“Well, I’m fine now.” That could not be farther from the truth. But at least he was better. Maybe.

“Looks like.” She smiled. It was forced. “Do you know when you’ll be out?”

“Not yet.”

Susan nodded a couple of times. “Well, we look forward to having you back.”

“Yeah.”

She stepped forward a little to squeeze his hand. 

“Happy belated birthday.”

She whispered a ‘see you at home, sweetheart’ to Max and left.

“That was weird.” Billy leaned back into his pile of un-soft hospital pillows. 

“I think she just feels bad.” Max sighed. “She was pretty worried about me, too. She’s the one that gives me rides back and forth.”

Billy had kind of been hoping Steve was secretly giving Max rides, and had just sworn her to secrecy. But no. He really was staying as far away as possible. 

Billy still hated his birthday.

Billy was serious about leaving. 

Max was too. 

It was funny, Billy felt a certain newfound sense of purpose, getting him and Max away from all this. Max felt almost the same. 

They tried to come up with a plan. They’d both saved a decent amount of money in the past few months, both secretly hoping to get away somehow, even for a small amount of time. Billy was worried Max would be scared. The plan was to leave and never come back. Didn’t that scare her? She was just a kid, how could she be so ready to leave all her newfound friends and leave any sense of financial security and-

“This is just as much my decision as it is yours.”

“If you stayed I would stay.” Billy said finally

“I don’t want to stay.”

Where would they go?

Who would help them?

It wasn't like they knew many adults out west. 

What about Max’s dad? That was complicated. And he’d just call Susan right away if he found out what they were doing.

“I don’t think we should.” Max looked withdrawn whenever she talked about her dad. 

Her mom didn't have many friends, and there were few people that woulndt immediatly just tell their parents where they’d gone.

Billy had a wish he wasn't going to voice until Max brought it up.

“We could look for your mom.” 

Billy felt his body tense for a second. He could see her, white dress, warm smile, he could hear her calling his name. 

“I have no idea where she is.” He said, turning back Max.   
They couldn't come up with anything. They’d run out of money by the time they got back to San Diego, they needed a place to stay.

“Wendy,” Billy realized.

“Who?” 

“You don’t know her. Wendy. She was my moms best friend for years. They went to college together, we used to hangout at her house. If she still lives in the same place, that's our best bet.”

“You don’t have a phone number or anything?”

“Nope.”

“So it’s a total shot in the dark?”

“Pretty much.” Billy looked across his shoulder at Max. “If you don’t want-”

“I want to leave.” Max met his gaze in her firey way. “I want to go home.”

Billy’s dad once made him promise he’d keep Max safe. 

That’s excatly what he planned to fucking do.

-

“Did you talk to Billy about leaving?’ El asked when Max got to the Byer’s house. 

“Yeah.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” A sentence El had perfected, making sure all her friends wer ok as a coping mechanism for her own not-ok-ness. She had barley spoken about Hopper since Starcourt to anyone except Joyce and Max, and even the only in bits and pieces.

_ Give it time, _ Mrs. Byers had advised Max.  _ These things take time. _

They talked about it in the livingroom. Mrs. Byers brought them juice and crackers and they watched The Tracy Ullman Show. Will watched with them for a while, him and El having bonded significantly in the past couple of weeks. 

Alone, later, Max thought of something she wanted said. 

El didn’t know tons about everything still, and she didn’t want Mike give her any wrong ideas. It seemed important to leave the correct impression on the place, the people, if they really were leaving. People always found things out after you left, anyway. 

“El,” Max started. “Do you know what the word gay means?”

“Gay?” El furrowed her brows. “Like, happy?”   
“No. There’s another meaning. Like,” Max chewed her cheek. “You know how you feel about Mike?”

“Yes.” El nodded, smiling a little. 

“And you know how he’s a boy, and you’re a girl?”

El nodded again.

“Sometimes, two boys feel that way, about each other. Or two girls. Does that make sense?”

“Like.. two girls… would be girlfriends?”

“Right, exactly.”

“And kiss and hold hands and things.”

“Yeah.”

“Makes sense. Why?”

“Well, a lot of people think that’s bad.”

“Why?”

“Bec- well- It’s difficult to explain. But it’s not bad. Trust me.”

“Ok.”

“So when someone like, a boy, feels about a boy the way you feel about Mike, that’s called being gay.”

“Like Billy?”

Max was surprised into silence.

“How- how did you know that?” She said finally.

“He doesn’t feel that way about girls, and it makes him sad. I saw.”

“You saw?”

“I saw what makes him sad. His dad, Hawkins, his mom being gone, his... “ She gestured up and down herself, across her shoulders, trying to articulate. “He doesn’t like girls, it makes him sad. But... if it’s not bad... why does it make him feel that way?”   
“He feels like he should.”

“That  _ is _ sad.” El frowned. “He would be more ok, I think, if he didnt feel that way.”

“I know.”

They were quiet for a bit.   
“Max?”   
“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry your house is a sad place.” El hugged Max across her shoulders. “I know what that’s like.”

“Thanks.”

“If you want to leave, I’ll be sad, but I’ll be happy for you, too.”

“Thanks, El. I’m just… I don’t want to leave you here.”

El shook her head. “I’m leaving, too.”

“What?”

“Joyce wants to leave. She wants to take Will and me somewhere safe.”

Max sat with that for a bit. “Do you think everyone’s gonna leave?”

“Even if it is safe here, it doesn't feel safe.”

“Yeah.”

Neither of them spoke for a moment.

“We’ll still be friends.” El squeezed her hand. “We’ll see each other again. I promise.”

Max realized she’d started crying. “Promise.”

Max hugged El back and cried for a little while. El cried, too.

“Miss you like hell.” El said earnestly.

“I’ll miss you too.” Max laughed through her tears.

Max really had fought to make the best of a bad situation. She had tried her hardest and nothing was enough. Knowing she didn't have to fight so hard, knowing she could pick a different path, no matter the cost, she felt freer.

She’d miss the party like crazy. They got her in a way she hadn't been got in forever. But she’d find people back in California. She’d find her people more easily, probably. Reconnect with friends from before. And she could call El, Lucas, anyone. They could visit.

And really?   
She’d be glad to be back home. 

Max knew Billy was protective of her. He’d looked out for her better in the past couple of months than anyone probably had in her life. She’d been kind of surprised when hed gotten distant again that week in July, but now she had an explanation. Which meant he really did care, and really was trying to save her- to save both of them.

She wanted to do the same. 

Max found Steve downtown on her way back to the Hospital.

Max skated up to Steve in front of the general store and kicked her board up, effectively getting his attention. He stopped.

“Max, what are you-”

“Do you know you’re a shitty boyfriend?” Max asked as loudly as she could. 

Steve tried frantically to shush her. 

“Cause you’re a shitty boyfriend.” She reiterated.

“Alright, alright.” Steve grabbed her arm, pulling her around the corner of the nearest building. “What do you want?”

“I want you to visit Billy.” 

“Max, you don’t understand-”

“Are you gonna say it’s complicated?”

“I mean, yeah.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“Max, it’s not-”

“You’re being a dick.”   
“He was a dick first! He was shit to me Max, I don’t even know if he’d want to see me, he-”

“He died, you know.” She couldn't help getting a little pissed off. “He died and you’re avoiding him.”

“You don’t-”

“You realize how fucked up that is?” More than a little pissed.

Steve didn’t say anything

“What are you waiting for? Him to go see you?”

Still nothing. He looked gutted a little. Good. She felt like she was doing something important.

“We’re leaving.” She said finally. 

“You- You’re what?”

“We’re leaving Hawkins. Back to California. After he gets out. It’s now or never, Steve. Don’t be stupid.” She walked away, still pretty mad, not looking back.

She did something important.

-

Steve went to Robin’s house, something he’d done many times in the past month. It was a good place to be in crisis. In the couple weeks he’d known them, Robin’s parents had started to adore him, which was good for Robin, who really milked it, trying to plat the idea that Steve might be courting her so they would think they’d thought of it themselves. Very smart. 

It was bad for Steve though, he felt super awkward everytime her mom hugged him and her dad shook his hand. 

She hopped into the living room, waving her parents off, and dragging him up to her room

Robin’s mom called up the stairs fro them to keep the door open.

“Oh yeah, cause we’re totally gonna have sex.” Robin muttered.

He asked Robin about it. About what Max had said.

“You let an 8th grader push you around?”   
“She’s very persuasive!”

“So you’re gonna go?”   
“I have to, right?”

“No, you don't.” Robin looked at him in her way, lowering her chin. “That’s really actually up to you.”

Steve wanted to go. He wanted to see Billy. 

But did he?

He had to.

He’d regret it forever if he didn’t.


	3. Now Leaving Indiana

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're in it now, boys

“Don’t be a dick,” Max said to him again when they got to the hospital. Max made Steve pick her up on his way there, she spent most of her time with Billy anyway. 

“Yeah Max, I got that. You know this isn't all my fault-”

“Don’t make excuses, either.”

“Max-”

“Also I hope everything turns out ok,” She said rather suddenly “I really like you, Steve. I liked you guys, you know, together.” 

He looked over at her. 

“Thanks, Max.”

They got guest passes at the front desk. They took the stairs (the elevator had to be repaired apparently, as did a lot of the third floor). Max settled with a magazine on one of the chairs outside. Steve stood motionless in front of Billy’s door for a few seconds.

He ran a hand through his hair. He straightened his jacket. He tried to breathe like a normal person, tried to prepare himself. 

He knocked. 

He wasn't prepared. 

Billy answered. He was there. He was right there in front of Steve, but different. Not as tan, not as built, not as… warm. Knocked down too many pegs. Drained. Faded. His shirt was scratched white. He was in sweatpants. Pink and purple and stark white marks were spattered across his entire body, like he was barely held together by all the wrong colors.

“Steve,” Billy said. That was all he said.

“Your hair’s gone,” Steve said without thinking. It was, it was like a rough undercut. Almost entirely shaved on the sides, short on top, probably longer than it had been a month ago.

Billy ran a hand across the back of his neck, where now nothing but blonde fuzz was. “Yeah. I had to get stitches”

“It’s not bad,” Steve said quickly.

“Didn't think it was.”

Steve pushed his hands deeper in his jacket pockets. “Can I come in?”

Billy stared at him for a few disconcerting seconds. 

“Sure.” Billy pushed the door open farther.

Steve was surprised by how lived in the room was. It had a short stack of plastic cups and three decks of cards in different colors and a transistor radio. He realized Billy’d basically been stuck in this room for upwards of a month. That must suck. Like, royally suck. And he was alone a lot of the time. That must suck too.

“Hey,” Steve started. “I’m-”

“Don’t say your sorry.” Billy folded his arms.

“Why?” Steve was a little taken back

“People have been apologising to me since I got here. Like, how sorry they are for me. Don’t do that.”

“I.. I’m not sorry for you.” Steve said.

“Good.” Billy sat down in one of the white and blue chairs by his bed that looked more plastic than comfort. 

“I just, I should have come to see you.”

Billy shrugged. 

“What does that mean?” Steve asked.

“Dunno.”

“Aren’t you pissed?”

“Aren't you?” Billy looked up.

Steve didn't say anything for a bit. 

“Yeah. I am.” He said finally. “But I’m also sad, and tired. And I’m glad you’re alive.”

It was Billy’s turn to be quiet. He grabbed a spare straw from his bedside table and bent it around his finger.

“Did Max send you?” He asked. 

“Yeah.”

“Figured.”

“She said you’re leaving. Are you leaving?”

“Yeah.”

“How?”

“What do you mean ‘how’?”

“There isn't an interstate bus for miles-”

“We’ll  _ walk _ .” Billy cut him off. 

Steve remembered saying something similar the day they broke up. Like, how was Steve going to get home without Billy to drive him?

He’d walk.

Steve considered Billy. He thought even though Billy looked half dead- he had died after all - he wasn't any less… dignified. 

He still had a certain tension through his whole body that must have always been there.

He didn't say anything, he just stared at Steve with blue eyes that had lost none of their intensity, just gained a level of hesitation. 

Steve sat down in a chair across from Billy. 

“California?” Steve asked. 

The word glittered in the air.

“Yep.”

Steve nodded a couple of times. 

“Aren’t you worried about you dad going after you?”

“A little.” Billy admitted. “But I mean, I’ve got dirt on him too, so it doesn't matter.”

“You’ve really thought about this?”

“Yeah.”

“And you’re really actually leaving? Forever?”

Billy closed off a little more. “Pretty much.”

Forever was a long time. Longer than Steve liked to think about anything being. And for him to have not seen Billy this long, to have been apart this long, this much, in this awful way, was more than he could really handle. 

“Let me drive you,” Steve said suddenly. 

“Steve, don’t-”

“No,” Steve’s mind raced. “I could drive you. I have a car. I could take you guys.”

“Why? ‘Cause you feel bad?”

“No,” Steve said firmly. “Because I want you to get back home.”

For a moment, the moment those words existed in, they weren’t so far away from each other. Steve remembered a starry night when they’d gone for a drive together- they used to do that all the time- and Billy had called California home. He wanted to go back home. 

“Just, think about it.” Steve shifted his feet.

Billy thought about it. 

“Fine.”

But Billy said he couldn’t drive.

“Did you get your license revoked?”

“Nope.”

He just couldn't drive

Here, ladies and germs, was the plan:

Max told Neil and Susan that their dear darling Billy got out of Hawkins General Friday morning. 

This was a blatant lie.

Billy would get out at 10am on Thursday. Steve and Max could pick him up. They’d have to sneak into the Hargrove/Mayfield house, both parents still at work, and pack everything they could as inconspicuously as possible. Max would return home at an inconspicuous hour, Billy would lay low at Steve’s, until they left, at 4am the following morning, all (hopefully) with a good night’s sleep. 

Robin found out about the plan. 

“TAKE ME WITH YOU.”

“What?” Steve started a little at the way she screeched it over the phone. 

“Steve, you have to take me with you.”

“Technically were breaking a couple laws-”   
“Don't care. I need to go to California. You know how many lesbians there are in Hawkins?”

“Well, I mean-”   
“One. And she’s me.”

“There could be others.”

“Yeah, there could, but do I want to risk looking for them? No, I do not.”

“But, you’ve never even met Billy-”

“I’ve met Max. Once.”

“I’m just not sure-”

“You also shouldn't drive back alone.”

“What?”

“You’re taking them to California, right?”

“Right.”

“So you’re gonna have to drive back. You shouldn't do that by yourself.”

“Yeah,” Steve sighed. “Probably not.”

Robin was just doing it to meet other lesbians, wasn’t she?

But no, she wasn’t. She really did want Steve to be ok.

“Solidarity, my dear Watson.”

“Solidarity.” He smiled a little.

-

Steve went to see Billy again on Wednesday. He asked about Robin coming.

“Who’s Robin?” 

“She’s a friend.” 

“You don’t have any friends,” Billy jabbed easily.

“Right,” Steve said. “She’s a new friend.”

“How do you know her?”

“What’s with the ninth degree?”

“You’re asking if she can drive with us. And she sent me a birthday card. Figured she might be important.”

“Yeah, well. She is. We got tortured by Russians together.”

“You got what?” Billy sat up.

“You… no one told you about that?”

“No! All I got was some weird shit about the whole Upside Down thing and a bunch of D&D mumbo jumbo.”

“That whole master race demon thing?”

“Like monster Nazis.” Billy nodded.

Steve launched into a long and confusing explanation of the gate under the mall (which made more sense the second time around) and being beat up by Russians and being drugged and Robin.

Robin and how smart she was. Robin and how funny and mean and sweet. Robin and how she’d cracked the code, spat in a Commie’s face, and called Steve a dingus as a term of annoyed endearment. How they’d bonded. 

Billy was jealous as hell. 

“Bonded?’ Billy aksed 

“Yeah, like, you know, ‘bonded by trauma’. Mrs. Byers explained it to me.”

“Mrs. Byers?”

“Yeah. She’s nice. She’s like, down to be anyone’s mom.”

“So are and Robin like a thing?” 

Billy knew he was giving himself away a little by asking, he couldn't keep the jealousy out of his tone. Fuck this, honestly.

“No, no no. “ Steve looked very ernest. “We are very much not a thing. Robin’s uh, she said I could tell you because, well I told her about… you.”

“You told her  _ what _ about me?” Billy was prepared to get pissed off. 

“She’s also.. You know.”

“What do I know?”   
“She’s gay.”   
“She’s a  _ lesbian _ ?”

“Yeah.”

“So lemme get this straight. You got kipnapped and interogated by Russians, with a lesbian, under Starcourt mall?”

“Yeah.”   
“Jesus, I can’t wait to leave this fucking town.”

Billy had wildly mixed feelings about this Robin person. But Steve mentioned moral support.

Fine, Robin could come.

Billy got the last round of hospital grade painkillers. He had no medical bills, was not due for any serious follow ups, and had to sign three different non-disclosure agreements he was told not to ask any questions about. That might have been the condition of the free ride.

On his way out, Billy waved a half-assed goodbye to the receptionist who he was on a first name basis with, and stepped outside. 

It was brighter than his hospital room, even though he’d always made them open all the windows. 

It smelled cleaner, felt warmer. 

Max ran out of Steve’s car to hug him. 

“Ah, careful.” He reminded her when she hugged too hard.

“Sorry, sorry.”

Max prevented Steve and Billy interacting from being too weird. They seemed like just friends for a bit, which was nice, very uncomplicated. They pulled up to the house no trouble. Steve and Max had brought boxes from the hardware store and the roll of duct tape Steve kept in his trunk, already discussing the best and least suspicious way to move things.

“Isn’t this illegal? Like, kidnapping illegal?” Max asked.

“Yeah.” Steve said.

“Doesn't that make you an accessory to my kidnapping?”

“Why put a label on it?” Steve handed her a box.

Max laughed.

Billy walked over the threshold of his home for the past year, and was struck by how normal it all semed. 

The browns and greys of the walls, the carpet, the upholstery was dusted in sunlight through smudged windows. The place hadn't missed him. He hadn't missed it, either. He walked through, vaguely remembering doing a thing like that in the midst of the Thing that Had Happened. 

It made him angry. Or it should have. Nothing made him anything anymore.

“They won’t be home till 5 so we have a few hours to get everything, but I said I’d be at Mike’s later.”

“Sure.” Billy was barely paying attention. 

Max made Steve help her, either because he was helpful or because she had guessed Billy would want to be alone in his room. 

Billy sat on his untouched unmade bed. A cloud rose from the comforter to catch the light around him. No one had touched the place. It should have made him angry. It didn’t.

He stared at the posters on the wall. They seemed stupid, now. Anything he liked, anything he wanted anyone else to think he liked. What was the point?

He got up and walked around the room, grabbing only things that struck him as necessary. None of the hair products, no nicknacks, just one bottle of cologne- his favorite. He’d only brought one box up anyway. 

He opened his closet and just sort of stared at it. He didn’t see much he wanted to take. He wanted to leave a lot of it behind. And up until then, he barely felt anything for this place, but right then, staring into his closet, he hated it. The hate was back. He hated this closet and he hated this room and this house and this town and his life and it was gone again. As suddenly as it had come back. 

He grabbed a couple things.

The things he had grabbed, the few of them there were, lay almost colorless on his bed. Except for the red button down. He had to take that. 

He filled up the box and called it, took it back down to Steve’s car. Steve’s bat was in his trunk when Billy opened it. Steve kept an insane amount of things in his trunk, like a rope, duct tape, the bat, two different first aid kits, three flashlights, water, a lucky baseball card from when he was twelve, but he’d pulled a lot of it out for Max and Billy to pack. The bat was still there. Billy ran his fingertips across the handle. It was smooth and worn from use. Dark stains were more clustered at the top, the handle still mostly the pale wood color. 

Steve came back out of the house with some of Max’s stuff, and Billy pulled his hand away. 

“Dude, Max has so many comic books.” Steve dropped the box on the edge fo the trunk, making the car bounce a little.   
“Yeah, she’s a loser.”   
“Hey, I’m right here.” Max propped the front door open with her foot.

“Is that all you’re taking?” Steve asked Billy.

“Pretty much.” Billy drummed his fingers on the box edge.   
“You should get your board out of the garage,” Max told him.

“Your board?” Steve turned.

“Surfboard.” Billy already started walking towards the back of the house. 

“You still have it?” Steve called.

Billy didn’t reply. 

They took the board. They had a hell of a time strapping it to Steve’s car roof, there were no rails or anything. They had to take it, though. 

-

Robin showed up around four, just as Max was leaving. She walked over, Walkman hooked to her belt. She said she liked the walk to Steve’s house for that reason. She’d made a tape especially for it that they played in his car sometimes, mostly ABBA, some Bruce Springsteen, a lot of Queen. Steve’s weird mix of glam rock, pop, and feelings. Steve had a lot of feelings, she’d learned in the past month.

She rang the doorbell over and over until he answered. 

But Steve didn’t answer. 

Billy did.

Lots of dots connected themselves. 

Billy wasn’t exactly the imposing figure she’d had described to her, but he was certainly intimidating, chewing a toothpick, looking her up and down. She remembered the several minutes in which Steve, trying to change conversation topics and failing, kept coming around to what Billy’s eyes were like. She saw his point, now meeting Billy. His eyes were intense as hell. Crystalline blue, focused, unwavering. Like he’d already sized you up. Like he knew things about you that you didn't even know about yourself. He leaned against the doorframe, so causal. Yeah, this was definitely the kind of guy Steve would fall for. 

“So you’re the dyke?” Billy took the toothpick out of his mouth.

“So you’re the dickwad!” Robin smiled and extended a hand.

“You’ve heard of me?” He shook it.

“All bad things.” 

Billy smiled a little. Very unsettling. “You’re funny. No one said you were funny.”

“What’d they say I was?”

“A smartass.”

“They were correct.”

“Robin, just ignore him!” Steve yelled from inside.

“Too late!” She called, stepping inside and shrugging off her backpack. 

Steve ran down the stairs. “What did your parents say?’ 

“I can go! I gotta be back by next Saturday though, we have a family thing. What did Billy say?”

“Only if you made a good impression.” Billy cut Steve off. “And you did, so, congrats.”

Robin was very aware of Billy staring at her. If this had been grade school, she probably fit the bill of the kind of kid he’d tortured on a daily basis. But there was a weird respect along with the intimidation. 

Maybe it was just that Steve liked her. 

Robin was willing to bet cold hard cash there was still something there, between Steve and Billy. Just what it was, though, she wasn't fully sure.

-

Max had told that party she was leaving only a day in advance. She didn’t want them to be sad during their last few weeks together. Lucas had guessed she might do something like that. El hugged her almost non stop when she got to Mike’s house. It seemed like she didn't know what to say, which was fine with Max. The Byers had been even more talking about leaving lately.

Maybe Max was just the first of many exits from Hawkins. Maybe it was time they all tried to move on.

The party convened in Mike’s basement to say goodbye to Max. No one kept it together for very long. Lucas got misty eyed first and then denied it for ten minutes until Max hugged him as tightly as she could.

They broke down one by one. They talked about Max, about then and now, about Starcourt in brief, about things that made it seem like nothing was changing and abut things that made it seem like never again would they meet in this basement. 

When Mrs. Wheeler came downstairs to check up on them, she aksed why they were all in hysterics.

“We’re fine, mom!” 

“Ok, ok.” She put her hands on her hips. “Well it’s time for Max to go home. Come up and say goodbye.”

More crying. 

Max walked up the stairs supported by both Lucas and El, trying to pull it together. 

“Call me, ok?” Max made El promise. “I want to make sure you’re ok.”

“I’ll be ok.” El smiled. “I’ll call.”

Just before Max left, Lucas gave her his Player’s Handbook. 

“Don’t open it until you’re in California” He made her promise. 

Ok. 

Ok. 

Goodbye!   
See you later!   
Come back!

  
  


Going to the Wheeler household wasn’t all too weird for Steve, especially since Nancy was almost never there these days. Since he started doing actual normal babysitting for the kids more regularly, all their parents knew and adored him. Steve liked to think of himself as a parent charmer. He used to imagine the Wheelers asked Nancy things like ‘whatever happened to that sweet Harrington boy? He was so well mannered and good at small talk and had good hair, way better than Jonathan Byer’s hair.’ But Steve digressed.

This time around, however, Steve felt a little confronted. He was sure it was just him being weird, but he was kind of forced to think about Billy in the way he’d been avoiding because of small talk with Mrs. Wheeler.

“Steve Harrington!” She smiled at him when she answered the door, wiping her hands on a stripped apron. 

“Hey, Mrs. Wheeler how’s it going?”

She laughed. “It’s going quite alright.”

“Is that pie I smell?”

“It certainly is, can I grab you a slice?’

“Oh, I’m good, I just don’t know how you manage to watch the kids and bake at the same time. I’ve burned so much food trying that.” 

Steve had to admit he admired Mrs. Wheeler quiet a bit. Like, she really seemed to have it on lock, the whole mom thing.

Holly was still up and Steve said hi to her, but she hid behind an armchair, even when Mrs. Wheeler reminded little Holly that she knew Steve, he’d babysat her many times.

Holly made no move to stop hiding and Mrs. Wheeler sighed and turned back to Steve.

“Which one are you here for?”

“Just Max for tonight.”

“I can grab her for you.” Mrs. Wheeler walked down to the basement.

“What's shakin’ Holly?” Steve asked the tuft of blonde hair that peaked out from around the armchair.

“Nothing,” Came the muffled reply.

“Did you get to have pie?”

“Yeah.”

“Was that fun?”

“Yes.” 

“Cool.” 

Mrs. Wheeler reappeared.    
“She’ll be up in a minute.” She nodded to Steve. “You get anything out of Holly?”

“A little.”

“Good for you.” Mrs. Wheeler straightened a lampshade as she spoke. “Steve?’

“Yes, Mrs. Wheeler?”

“Aren’t you friends with, um, Billy Hargrove?”   
Steve stalled out a little. “Uh, yeah.” 

Was he friends with Billy? Were they friends? Were they exes? They had never talked about it. Did Mrs. Wheeler know? No, that’s crazy.

“Well, you know, the fire’s been all over the news for a month now, all the people we lost. So sad.”

“Yeah,” Steve focused very hard on not doing anything like blushing or getting choked up or really an expression at all. 

“I just wondered if he’s doing alright. I heard he was hospitalized.”

“Yeah, he’s ok. Well, he- yeah, he’s fine.”

“That’s good.” Mrs. Wheeler cleared her throat a little.

Steve tried to think of something normal and not sad or gay to say about Billy when Max appeared at the top of the stairs and he was saved.

Max was trying not hide the fact that she’d been crying when she came upstairs.

“You ok?” Steve aksed her when they got in the car.

“I’ll be fine.”

“You’re a good kid, Max.” He said very seriously.

“Thanks, Steve.”

“Yeah, I mean it. And you know? Your gonna get to see those meatheads again before you know it. High school? Goes by in a flash.”

Steve spent most of the drive back to her house trying to pep talk her. She pretend to hate it. It helped. 

“See ya later, skater!” He called as she walked up to her house.

“Thanks for the ride!” She called back.

Max ate dinner with her mom and Neil. Not much happened. She was quiet while they talked about what books the were reading and how the town was bouncing back economically.

Max wasn't really listening until her mom spoke to her

“Getting your brother back tomorrow. Excited, sweetheart?” 

“Yeah, I am.”

Max waited up watching cartoons in the living room for Neil to go to bed. Her mom walked through not soon after saying she was going to do the same. 

“Mom?”

Her mom turned around, clearly tired. “What is it, Max?”

“I love you,” Max said.

Her mom smiled, which she never did, and hugged her, which she never did either. 

“I love you too, sweetheart. See you in the morning.”

“See you.” Max felt her throat constrict. 

Sometimes when she was little, back in California, she’d run to her parents- her real parents- room after having nightmares. Max would get to sleep next to her mom and dad on their old king size bed. They would both wake fully up to make sure she was ok. She remembered feeling happy, like they were having a sleepover almost. Her dad might read to her, her mom might brush and braid her hair. 

Max wanted that now. She wanted that feeling of closeness with her mother that seemed so painfully far away. She wanted, she admitted to herself, to be a family. She wished Billy's dad wasn’t an asshole. She wished her mom would act like she cared, grow a backbone. She wished Billy was ok more. 

She wished she was ok more.

But it wasn't like that here. 

It never was.

It could be in California. 

She couldn't sleep that night, so she wrote a letter.

At 4am on the dot, Max snuck her backpack and pillow down the stairs, the only two things left in her now almost baren room. 

The dark blue sky glowed lighter at the edge when Max stepped outside, carefully closing the door behind her. 

Billy helped her get the last of her stuff in Steve’s car. 

Steve tried not to peel out on the pavement outside the Hargrove/Mayfield house. Billy and Robin were already focused on the map. Max was the only one staring out a window, watching the house she hated in the town she loved get father an father away, until she couldn't even see the glow of the streetlight.

_ See you later! _

Everyone knew how to get out of Hawkins. Few people did it, but everyone knew how. The curse of the small town mindset. So Steve knew pretty much where he was going as far as going west out of Hawkins. 

Everyone except Billy knew that meant passing Starcourt. 

Or what was left of it.

So he was the only one surprised when they passed the chard piles of concrete and glass.

Billy didn’t say or do anything at first. Then he knew he had to get out of the car. 

“Steve,” He sat up. “Pull over.”

“Are you sure that-”   
“ _ Pull over. _ ”

Steve pulled over. 

Billy pulled himself out of the backseat, aware that Steve tried to follow and Max stooped him, aware that everyone was staring at him, thinking what they thought he must be thinking. 

But he wasn't really thinking about anything.

Just that he had to see it.

They were just at the edge of what used to be the parking lot. Most of that part was still in tact. So Billy didn’t think much of how flat the concrete felt under his shoes until he hit the ruble. It hadn’t been this bad, this destroyed.

He remembered parts of it, like the end.

The very end.

The mall was still standing. It was completely wrecked but still standing. 

Now, parts of it were collapsed, the whole thing was streaked from the base up with black. 

The sign was half burred in concrete. 

“What happened to it?” Billy called over his shoulder, not looking back. He hoped Max would answer. She did.

“They burned it down. To look like an accident.”

This was where anger should be. This was where he should get angry. Jesus, why wasn't he angry?

But walking closer he recognised a smear of color along the base of the wreckage.

It was a memorial. A gigantic one, like the ones he’d seen as a kid back in California for Day of the Dead. 

Pictures and candles and stuffed animals and newspaper clippings and letters and postcards and flowers. Hundreds of flowers. Most of them wilted in their glass jars and plastic cups, but some fresh. The sweet floral smell made the bitterness of the ash taste sour in the air. People came back out here. It had only been a month, after all. 

Everyone that had died, everyone… 

It had all been blamed on the fire. 

Billy walked along the pile of memorabilia when he got closer. He knew who he was looking for. He found her.

Scrawled across a yearbook photo:

_ Heather Holloway _

_ 1967-1985 _

Billy felt something other than anger. 

He crouched by the photo. He didn’t pick it up, he didn’t want to knock over anything. He just touched it, traced a hand across it. Because he remembered Heather. He remembered weird things about her, like her smile, and her middle name, and what shoes she wore everyday until she died. 

He didn’t know, for example, when her birthday was, what her favorite color might have been, or anything else really.

He just knew things she must have thought of. The snatches of individuality she got under the thing the kids called The Mind Flayer. 

And he remembered feeling scared. 

Billy felt his throat constrict, his eyes burn a little.

Heather didn’t die from a fire. 

She died because of Billy. The thoughts he tried not to have came crashing through his head. It was all his fault, no matter what anyone said, he shouldn’t be here, he should be dead-

“Billy!”

He turned over his shoulder. Max was at the edge of the debris.

“We have to go! The sun’s up!”

Billy stood up. He tapped his pockets, looking for something. He had to leave something. You couldn't just go to a graveward without flowers. 

He found a quarter. 

That worked, like the coins you’d put on dead soldier’s eyes. 

He set the quarter heads up just in front of Heather's photo. She was smiling in it, wearing a blue dress. 

_ Maybe she can get herself a gumball in heaven,  _ Billy thought.

If he’d died, he doubted he’d have gotten there himself.

Then he walked back over to Max, Back to the car, and they left Hawkins for good.

-

When Neil and Susan Hargrove (nee, Mayfeild) got to Hawkins General to pick up their son, the receptionist informed them he’d already checked out. He was 18, after all. 

He was in change of his own well being. 

Both Billy and Max were no where to be found. 

Their rooms were missing several key items. 

It was obvious they’d run away.

Neil went to the police, claiming a kidnapping of his own, darling daughter. 

But someone, somewhere alone the line, had informed stand-in Police Chief Callahan of the goings on at this particular household. 

Callahan assured Mr. Hargorve, he’d do anything warranted necessary. 

However, he should be aware they’d have to look in depth at the family’s living situation if he wanted an investigation conducted. Perhaps he’d prefer to let bygones be bygones. 

“We might be looking at a whole other set of allrigations, sir.” Callahan finished. 

“How dare you imply-”

Susan Hargrove had been totally unresponsive up until this point. Her eyes tracked, she was expressionless, motionless, save the piece of paper clutched in her hand. She’d read it maybe a thousand times in the past hour of Neil raging and yelling and breaking a plate against the kitchen wall and saying over and over that son of a bitch better come back unless he wanted trouble. 

Neil dragged her to the police station, said she should be outraged, she should make a statement.

She thought about it

She had been quiet all her life. She’d often wondered how she’d gotten such a loud child. Susan never did anything she wasn't supposed to, even when she was young. She was a perfect wife, a perfect mother she’d deluded herself into beliving. But reading and rereading the letter in her hand, she knew that wasn't true. She’d known that wasn't true as soon as she decided to visit Billy in the hospital. She’d just hoped if she started trying now, if she stepped up to the plat now, she could get Max back. They could be a family again. All she ever wanted was a happy family. 

_ Mom, _

_ I’m leaving with Billy. I’m not coming back. Please don’t look for us. It’s not his fault or anything. It was my idea. I can't stay with you, mom. I know you might not understand now, but I hope you might later. You told me once that you thought I was a strong little girl. I know what that means now. _

_ I love you. A lot. _

_ Your daughter,  _

_ Max Mayfeild _

She couldn't have Max back, she knew that deep down, just then in that gloomy police station. She couldn't have her life back.

But Max could. 

“You should listen to the man, Neil.” She said evenly, cutting him off. “We don’t want any trouble, do we?”

It wasn't looked into any farther. People tended to disappear from Hawkins, Indiana. 


	4. I am in Missouri/Kansas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I HATED this chapter so what did I do? I deleted it and added some stuff and I hate it much less. Maybe even like it a bit. Enjoy the better version o this and Chapter Five hopefully up on Monday.  
All my love,  
Gogo

Around noon, they got lost. They got through Illinois fast enough. Out of Columbia, Missouri was a mess, though.

“Why didn't you just ask which way to turn?”

“Because I figured I’d pick the right way!”

“So what you’re saying is, we’re lost.” Robin sighed.

“We’re not lost.” Steve put his hand out in defense. “We just-”

“‘We’?” Max leaned forward from the backseat. 

“ _ I _ ,” Steve rolled his eyes. “Just don’t know where we are.”

“So we’re lost,” Robin repeated.

“Listen-” Steve tried.

“Gimme the map.” Billy grabbed it back from Robin.

“Hey-” She objected.

“Oh my god Steve just admit we’re lost and pull over!” Max sat back, exasperated.

“We’re not lost.” Billy said, flattening out the map. “Cause see here's the I-70 and… no, yeah, we’re lost. Steve got us lost.”

“How is this my fault? I can’t map and drive for five straight hours-!”

They pulled over. 

Robin grabbed the map back from Billy and smoothed it out across the hood of Steve’s car. 

“Ok, I’m putting Max and I in charge of navigating because we’re the only ones who aren't totally useless with directions.”

Steve yelled “What?” At the same time Billy shrugged and said. “That’s fair.”

Max grabbed a compass out of her pocket and Robin started marking up the map with a pencil, fully excluding both guys from the conversation.

Steve kicked a rock. Billy leaned back against the side of the car and pulled another toothpick out of his pocket. 

“What’s with the toothpicks, anyway?” Steve asked him.

“It’s not like I can smoke, is it?” Billy chewed the end of it a little. 

Steve remembered watching Billy smoke. Watch the white laciness of it curl around Billy’s face. He remembered Billy's sort of devious smile, the glint in his eyes. 

This Billy that leaned against his car stared at the ground below his boots and frowned away from the sunlight was different.

He was so much  _ less _ .

Little pieces of heartbreak echoed like a memory in Steve’s chest.

Billy knew Steve was staring at him. Probably trying to sort out why everything was so different, when it just  _ was _ . Of course it was, how else would it be?

Billy was different. He thought different things, did things different, felt things different- didn’t feel things at all. 

Just hollow. Like an empty house. Like being outside too long.

Steve was probably looking for the person that Billy wasn’t anymore. He was so very aware that he was less firey, less brash and bold, and thanks, Steve, for reminding him. 

But Steve wasn't paying attention to him anymore, he’d walked off farther down the road, maybe blowing off steam, maybe just wandering for no reason.

Billy turned to read the map over Max’s shoulder, trying to keep his brain moving, when Steve’s voice called to them from the roadside.

“Hey guys!” 

Everyone turned. 

He was standing a fair ways away, under a horribly beaten up sign.

“We’re in Mis-our-i! Get it? Like misery?”

“What did you see in him?” Robin mumbled to Billy.

Billy leaned back from Robin, surprised.

She made a face at him.

_ Get over yourself. _

“Do you guys get it?” Steve called again.

“We got it, Steve,” Max called back. 

“Ok!” He nodded a couple of times. “I thought it was pretty good.”

“Remember how Erica said you might have brain damage?” Robin called.

“Hey, now.” Steve folded his arms. 

“Who’s Erica?” Billy asked. 

“Jesus, you weren't there for any of it, were you?” Robin looked over her shoulder at him. 

“Not really.”

Max leaned against Billy a little. She did that whenever anyone talked about what happened before. Billy thought maybe she was trying to remind herself that he was really there. He wished he could do that too.

“Ok,” Steve walked back over. “What I meant was, I found a sign. We’re like thirty miles from the Missouri-Kansas Border.”

“Why couldn't you have lead with that?” Robin poked him in the arm before turning the angle of the map. 

“What road did it say we’re on?” Max asked him.

Steve pointed. 

They got back in the car and back on track. 

Robin kept pointing out fun roadside attractions and historical monuments they were close to every hour or so, trying and succeeding in single-handedly keeping conversations going. Robin was a god-send. Steve was glad she demanded to join them. 

When they stopped for gas in Kansas City, Robin had a brilliant idea.

“We have to drive a minimum of thirty hours in the next few days, we’re all gonna go crazy and die if we don’t get new music.”

“I have been really wanting that new Simple Minds tape,” Steve said.

“No way in hell am I listening to Simple Minds,” Billy objected.

They found a hole-in-the-wall record store only a couple blocks away. It smelled like old cigarettes and plastic and the girl at the counter was on the phone the whole iem, acting like they’d interrupted her by walking into the store. 

Waking around Kansas City was fun, Seve had only been out of state a couple of times.

“Really?” Robin was flicking through every avaible Smiths tape, hoping for a marked down  _ Meat is Murder. _

“Have you?” He asked her.

“We went out of state all the time for band competitions.”

“Buckley, you’re a band kid?” Billy walked behind her.

“Say whatever you want, I’m fine not being cool.” She pulled up a tape, checked the price, frowned, and put it back. 

Max was lamenting the lack of west coast punk when they all saw the Manic Panic display.

Bright pink, red, blue, and purple stared back at them. Even one container of green. No one in Hawkins had dyed hair, they'd get the shit kicked out of them the minute anyone saw it. No one took chances in Hawkins. 

But they weren't in Hawkins anymore.

They were in a music shop in Kansas city, on their way to California.

“I wanna dye my hair.” Robin said suddenly.

“What? Robin-”

“Live a little, dingus.” She said over her shoulder as she snagged a tub of red from the shelf. “I’ve already got highlights. What’s a little color?”

“You’re gonna get so much shit for that when we get back.”

“Don’t care.” Robin walked with maybe too much confidence to the register, forcing the now very annoyed punk girl off the phone and ring up their two tapes (a best of The Clash and Diamond Dogs), an Offspring pin Max wanted and the tub of hair dye. 

They spent more money than they should have, but for the first time in a while, all of them felt the freedom of it. Of being kids in a big city, of being far from home.

Probably why Robin was impulse dying her hair. She’d told Steve she wanted to dye her hair before, but like, fleetingly and with lots of qualifiers. Because no one dyed their hair in Hawkins unless something was  _ there _ . Like the all of five punk kids, the kids who were weird and deviant, and of course, anyone rumored to be a queer. Robin would be put under that fire. She was a girl, so she could maybe get away with it, but just out of Hawkins city limits Steve felt the recklessness seeping into him as well. Or maybe just the relaxation of not having to actively hide anything, not having to be on guard. 

He watched Billy walk as they made their way back to the car. He had a limp. It was slight, and he didn’t wince or anything, but Steve could see him tense when he moved, see his jaw flex when he gritted his teeth to crouch or reach up.

_ It’s not fair for him to be in that much pain. _

He might have said something, might have tried to talk to Billy. Was that allowed? Could they talk like friends? Like reluctant allies?   
_ Like somebody you used to bare more than just your heart to? _

Might not have worked anyway, Billy was still mostly quiet, still mostly subdued, but he make conversation with Max just fine. Back in May, when they’d been- well, when they hadn't been not talking, Steve remembered how easy Max and Billy had gotten around each other. Now, they weren't just at ease, they seemed like a duo, an inseparable pair.

Well, a duo that cussed one another out at any given opportunity, but reliable nonetheless. 

Good. 

He was, you know, happy for Billy. That he was doing ok. 

Without Steve.

_ Don’t talk to him, don’t think about him, don’t even look at him.  _

But Steve was staring at Billy again. Did he not get that distance was a good fucking idea? Like, there was a lot of just  _ shit  _ to work through, or around, or suppress as hard as you could, they should just leave it be. Don’t talk about it, don’t think about it. 

But of course Billy had to sit up front.

Too long in the backseat meant leg cramps shoulder clicking back aching bullshit, and he wasn't up for that for more than like an hour.

The dosage of painkillers was probably too low, or something. Billy learned a lot more about medication than he’d ever wanted to know during his time in the hospital, but he knew he shouldn't take more, he didn't want to run out. 

It just sucked.

They drove in silence for a while, Max and Robin having fallen asleep, before Steve broke it.

“Where are we going in San Diego anyway?” He said over the steering wheel.

“Wendy’s house. In Pacific Beach.”

“And who is that?”

“She’s an old friend of my mom’s.”

Steve didn’t respond right away. Billy didn’t talk about his mom if he could avoid it.

“How do you know if she still lives there? I thought, you know… that was all when you were ten?”

“I saw Wendy even after my mom left.” Billy said. “My mom asked her to keep an eye out for me. I used to crash at her house sometimes when I couldn’t go home. She even bailed me out of jail once. Still haven't paid her back for that.”

“She sounds nice.”

“She is. Weird as shit, has like six cats. Total hippie. But nice.”

“So when did you last see her?”

“Year and a half ago.”

“And you think she still lives in where again?”

“Pacific Beach. Yeah, I do.”

“What are you gonna do when you get there?”

“Ask her if Max and me can crash ‘til I get a job.”   
Steve nodded a couple of times. 

“Good plan.”

Billy just nodded at him, before gritting his teeth a little, trying to sit in a way that would make his shoulder stop lighting up with pain every time they drove over a pebble. 

“You ok?” Steve asked. 

“Fine.”

Billy noticed Steve casting him a worried glance.

“Just hurts.”

“Like how?” Steve asked.

That was an olive branch. That was Steve asking him a lot more than what he’d said.

_ Talk to me. _

“Like,” Billy thought about it. “Like my bones are sore, you know? Like I got food poisoning and was hit by a car but, times a hundred.”

“To be fair you  _ were _ hit by a car,” Steve said.

“What?”

“The car crash. In front of the mall. Robin and I hit your car with that sexy convertible-”

“You WHAT?”

Max, just having found a bearable sleeping position by shoving her own sweatshirt against the backseat window, woke up to Billy yelling and briefly thought there was an emergency when she registered what he was saying. 

“-Harrington you son of a  _ bitch _ ! You have any idea what that car meant to me-?”

“I know! I know! I’m sorry-!”   
“Jesus fucking Christ-!”

“Hey guys!” Max yelled over both of them. “Some of us are trying to sleep!”

“Are you talking about how Steve and I T-boned Billy’s car?” Robin mumbled, not fully awake. 

“You’re dead to me,” He turned over the shoulder of the passenger seat to point from Steve to Robin. “You’re both dead to me.”

Steve was kind of worried he was actually pissed when Robin started laughing. 

“I’m serious, Buckley! You’re on my fucking list.” Billy struggled to keep a straight face.

“Steve was driving!” She managed through peels of sleep deprived laughter. 

“Oh, way to throw me under the bus, Robin.” 

Billy turned back to Steve. “You know,” He tried not to smile, might have been kidding on the square. “I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to forgive you. You wreck my car, you don’t visit me for a month after I actually died-”

“You did do that.” Robin sobered a little. 

“Not visit or die?’ Steve asked.

“Both.”

Steve hoped he was making up for that right now, and Billy and Robin kept up their newfound brand of banter and Steve watched the road, feeling maybe a little more ok.

There were more tumble weeds than they expected. Someone saw an eagle. Quiet was quiet, loud was quiet soon after.

“I’m bored.” Max announced somewhere in the middle of Kansas. Steve was just about ready to tap out but nowhere in Kansas was truly nowhere. They had to find civilization before he could get some rest.

“Me too.” Robin sat forward in her seat. “Steve, I’m going through your car.”

“What? Robin-”

She popped open the glovebox just in front of her and started digging around in it.

“Can you not go through my car please?” Steve tried.

“Whatever you’ve got in here has got to be better than endlessly flat land.” Max pointed out.

”Let’s play, “What’s in Steve’s Glove Box!”’ Robin dramatized. “Any guesses, gang?”

“A gun.” Max said immediately. 

“A bunch of napkins!” Robin held up a fistful of the crumpled paper. “Guess again.”

“Car manual.” Billy didn't even look up from the map.

“One car manual, very good Contestant.” 

“Nerd.” Billy mumbled. 

“Hey, it is not nerdy to have a car manual. It is responsible.”

“Just learn how your fucking car works.” Billy kicked the back of his seat.

“Any more guesses?” Robin pulled out a single greying Altoid and wiggled her eyebrows. 

“Compass.” Max tried.

“Yep.”

“Flashlight.”

Robin clicked it over and over aggressively. 

“Ok, guys, stop.” Steve tried to stop Robin digging around but she waved him off and he was still driving. 

“Oh, boy,” Robin stifled a laugh. “Ten bucks to whoever guesses this next one.”

“A second, smaller flashlight?”

“Cocaine.”

“A box of  _ premium _ Trojan Condoms.” Robin swung the tab of the box between two fingers. “Classy!”

“GROSS,” Max yelled.

“Nice,” Billy chuckled.

“Robin!” Steve knocked the box out of her hands. 

She could barely answer through her own giggling. “What? You’re prepared for any eventuality.”

“And what is Steve Harrington if not prepared?” Billy added helpfully.

“Yeah, ok, thank you. End of game.” Steve flicked Robin in the arm.

“Ow, rude.” 

It took people a while to gainBilly's favor, but he liked Robin decently already. She was gusty, and vulgar, and smart as a whip. She had the brand of humor that could make anyone laugh, from the pedestrian to the sick and twisted. 

Or he would have liked robin, if he wasn't so goddamn jealous of her every waking second. 

Because she was everything Billy should have been. 

Should have been, more specifically, for Steve. 

One, she was a girl, two she was pretty in, sort of zeek-y way, if you were into that, which he knew Steve was, and she was rude and blunt but she wants mean.

She wasn't bad.

She was the perfect candidate for Steve.

If she wasn’t gay as Billy was, he might have ripped her to shreds by now.

She was laughing, her brief stint in the front seat, and making Steve laugh. His stupid blunt and airy laugh. So easy. So perfect. 

_ Keep your distance. _

Of course he was keeping his distance, it was a bad idea before, and it was too late now. It was dumb to think about all the times he’d me Steve laugh like that, smle like that, talk that animatedly. All the times he’d got to make Steve happy. 

Steve deserved to be happy. 

Without Billy.

  
  


They found the only motel in a maybe 50 mile radius and were relieved that it wasn't crazy expensive just as the sun was setting. 

“We started early, we’re turning in early.” Steve said as he was getting out of the car, digging his wallet out of his jacket pocket. “Besides, we’re almost to Colorado. Makin’ crazy good time.”

Max asked if they could order pizza.

Robin jumped at the idea. “Dad, can we order pizza?’ She called to Steve.

“Do whatever, I’ll pay.” He ignored her teasing.

“Steve, no.” Billy tried to stop him. 

“Don’t worry about it, man.” Steve brushed him off.

When they got inside the grungy and dim motel, the lady behind the desk looked them up and down very thoroughly.

“College road trip,” Robin grimaced when the lady tried to question them. 

They got two rooms, and Robin was tempted to suggest they split up into boys and girls but let Steve grab her arm and steer her to a room just the two of them. 

“The receptionist lady’s gonna think were having a bonefest.” Robin told him.

“Everyone always thinks that and I’ve given up caring.”

She laughed.

They all ended up hanging out in Billy and Max’s room after everyone changed and got the road trip gunkiness out of their personages. 

Steve took and epicly long shower and everyone made fun of him for actually pulling back his hair to do it.

“Just because I care about how the world sees me-”

“You packed a hairdryer. Battery powered,” Robin reminded him.

Steve flipped her off and she batted his hand away in mock offense.

They ordered pizza from a decidedly sketchy place up the block. Steve offered to pick it up. 

There were about 20 minutes of downtime where Billy was flicking through TV channels, completely fine to ignore Max and Robin’s presence, so they hauled up in the bathroom to (finally) dye Robin’s hair. 

She’d been waiting, excited or scared she couldn't tell, for hours. Like she’d gotten highlights a month or so ago. And one time she shaved the underside of her hair, keeping the majority of it long enough that no one would notice if she kept it down. Little rebellions. But this was a big one. She was glad Max was there. Even though Max had never done anything major to her own hair she’d supported a couple of her friends through it apparently. More common in California. Robin read the instructions over and over and Max told her to just go for it so she did.

“You know the party already likes you, if you’re worried.” Max said unprompted just as Robin had begun to split her hair into smaller sections.

“Really?”

“For sure. You’re like, Steve’s friend, but Dustin totally sang your praises after Starcourt.”

Robin laughed. “My thanks to Dustin.”

“Yeah,” Max sighed.

“You miss them?” Robin asked, reading Max’s sort of wistful tone.

“Yeah.”

“Sucks ass.”

“Totally.” Max smiled a little surprised that Robin hadn’t immediately pep talked her. 

“You know, I moved towns when I was maybe, ten. Not far, just a couple counties away to Hawkins, but I missed my old friends so bad for ages. Sucked.”

“I mean, I miss my California friends, too. So I’m mostly focusing on that.”   
“What’re they like? Also nerds?”

Max talked for a bit about them, other kids that skated, other kids that played video games, but no one she knew back home played D&D.

“I would honestly love to try D&D.” Robin took down more of her hair to work the red goo through.

“Seriously?”

“Sure. I know how uncool I am. I have nothing to lose.”

“I could teach you!” Max lit up. “I have the basics down now.”

They talked about that for a bit. 

Then about music. 

Then about Steve. 

The connection being bad music = Steve’s music.

“Steve loves you, dude.” Robin was working through her roots. “You’re like one of his favorites”

“Seriously?”

“Sure it’s like, Dustin, you... wait hold on” Robin held out her stained and sticky hands to count on “Dustin, you, Lucas because he’s smart, Will, El because he doesn’t know her very well, and Mike.”

“Mikes last?” Max grinned

“Yeah, from what I’ve heard he’s kind of annoying.”

“He hates me. With like, a burning passion.”

“That so?”

“Yeah it’s cause of El. Like he doesn’t want her to have friends or some bullshit. You know how boys are.”

“I don’t know anything about boys and I don’t care for them.”

Max laughed.

“You’re pretty easy to talk to Max.”

“Compared to?”

“Your brother, I guess.”

“Billy’s an asshole. 

“I kinda got that.”

“Yeah. The only person who can just start talking to him is Steve. Steve can say all of two things and Billy will actually try to make conversation.”

Robin laughed. 

“Billy told me Steve told you about them.”

“A little.”

“Cause you’re gay, right?”

Robin hesitated a little. She was just surprised, no one had ever asked her that like it was no big thing. No one had ever asked her that at all.

“Uh, yeah.”

“You can ask me anything you want as long as it’s not totally gross/”

Robin was hoping for that. 

“Well, what’s the rundown?”

Max explained the whole thing from start to finish. When they got together, when they started going on dates they never called dates, how Billy got nicer the longer that went on, how eventually he started asking Max to ie about when he got home, and he’d lie for her back, how everything was getting better.

“I think something happened. With his dad.” Max explained. 

“I've heard Mr. Hargrove is bad news.”

“Very bad news. Billy stopped seeing Steve and then he started being all cold and mean again, and I thought it was just because of that, but then, you know, Starcourt.”

“Yeah,” Robin nodded.

Max didn’t say anything for a bit.

“You’re pretty cool, Max.”

“Thanks. So are you, you know.”

Robin laughed again, smoothing down her hair.

Steve came back soon after the girls finished up Robin’s hair. He threw the door open, pizza in hand, to yell “Party in the bathroom!” And sit in the bathtub like it was couch, his legs over the side. 

Billy came in under the pretense of dinner and stayed to tell Robin her hair looked ‘pretty legit’ and talk to Max about how they were going to fix something on her skateboard.

They stayed, all four of them, chatting in the bathroom, weirdly enough.

Robin forced Steve out of the tub to rinse her hair. It was more pink then red after being toweled down but Max said she loved it. Robin and Max start talking music again, allowing comments from Billy but not from Steve because he knew nothing.

“Sometimes music is popular because it's good! Like ABBA!”   
“Ok, Steve.”

Steve rolled his eyes. He listened for a bit before Billy sat on the floor next to him and said, 

“I like Robin.”

“Yeah? I thought you might.”

“Yeah, she hates you almost as much as I do.”

“Oh, ha ha.”

Robin watched them talk out of the corner of her eye. 

She’d never really seen Steve the way he was around Billy. Like, that lit up. That animated, that shiny. 

She saw him laugh. 

She smiled. 

_ He deserves a break. _

Billy left rooms very decisively. Like, he just got up and left to go to bed without making any statements about it. Maybe Robin just announced where she was going more than most people? But maybe most people did that and Billy was just weird. Probably the latter. But at any rate that prompted Max to leave and Steve and Robin were alone to get ready and go the fuck to sleep.

Robin was reading cross legged on the motel bed when Steve collapsed onto the mattress beside her.

“Does it bother you that everyone thinks we’re dating?”

He rolled over, knocking his head into her knee a little. “Not really. You?”

“Nah. Just thought I’d ask.”

They were quiet for a bit, comfortable silence, Steve’s head against her leg. Robin’s hand on his shoulder. 

“What are you reading?”

“Animal Farm. Ercia told me to.”

“Are you friends with a ten year old or something?”

“Shut up!”

Steve laughed. “She’s even nerdier than you.”

“She’d kill you if you said that to her face.”

“It’s true!”

Steve really did deserve a break. His sleep schedule was getting gradually more and more fucked up. Which meant later in the night, when Robin heard a splash in the motel pool out from their window, she tried not to wake him up as she got up to look out. It didn't work.

“Everyone alive?” Was the first groggy thing he said. It made Robin sad in the pale blues and greys of the middle of the night.

“Everyone's fine. Go back to sleep.”

“You’re ok?”   
“I’m ok. Get some rest, lil’ Stevie.” She brushed a hand through his hair. 

He raised his own hand to sleepily grab hers, then let it drop.

Robin got up, padded across the room to pull back the shittily patterned curtain and look out over the fluorescent blue glow of the pool. 

It was Billy. Going for a swim in the middle of the night.

“What a weirdo,” She whispered to herself. 

Robin thought how, if she were Steve, she’d be down there making sure he was ok, making sure nothing was weird. Asking ‘Hey man, you good?’

If she were Steve. But she wasn’t. And he was asleep. 

She turned around to look at Steve, asleep, drooling (gross), peaceful, if for the moment.

Should she go check up on Billy?

No, right?

I mean, she didn’t really know him that well, other than the Big Thing they knew about each other. 

And he wasn't  _ extremely _ personable. 

But Steve would go.

_ ‘Everyone ok?’ _

Robin sighed heavily.

She snagged a baby bottle of vodka from the minifridge before going down. Everyone could bind over alcohol, right? She took a swig of it herself.

She made a great deal of effort in the room door closing silently. She could hear the pool water hitting the tile at the sides, now that she was outside.

She really should have worn shoes, feeling that weird pebble-concrete apartments and motels semed to always have on their stairs freezing cold under her feet as she walked down.

The gate creaked when she walked into the pool area, so she knew Billy knew she was there, but he didn’t look at her, or like, acknowledge that she was there in any way. 

She sat down near the pools edge, pulling her long shirt sleeves over her hands.

Billy resurfaced from where he dove under, smoothing down his shorter-than-Robin-had-pictured hair. He looked at her.

  
  


“You spying on me, Buckley?” Billy wiped the over chlorinated pool water from his face. 

“Pretty much.”

“What do you want?” Why was she down here?

“Nothing. Thought you might want company.”

“You really don’t know me at all then.” Maybe she’d just leave.

“Misery wants company.”

“You think I’m miserable?”

“Yep.”

“Aren’t you charming.”

“Thank you.”

Billy hauled himself up onto the edge of the pool, sitting next to Robin, who got a little splashed but didn’t seem to care.

She held out one of those tiny plastic liquor bottles.

“What’s this?”

“Just a lil’ something from the minibar. Nothing special.”

Billy smiled a little. “You’re gnarlier than you look, Buckley.”

“My system can pretty much handle anything after the Soviet truth serum.”

Billy knocked some of it back.

“I never used to drink.” Robin said, staring at the pool water. “I don’t do it a lot, it’s just, less unfamiliar now, I guess.”

“Takes the edge off.” 

Robin nodded.

“Do you think we’re the only ones in Hawkins?” Robin asked him, cutting into the sounds of crickets and pool filter that made up the night around them. 

Billy didn’t say anything right away. He’d sort of expected her to ask him about Steve, or about his family. She struck him as nosey, above all else, like maybe she would be the kind of person to just pry and not know how shitty that felt to the people whose lives you wanted to disect. But no, she asked about the thing they had in common. The thing Billy would have loved to ask someone else when he was younger: am I the only one I know?

“I’m not from Hawkins. And I’m going to deny ever having lived there when I get home.”

“Right, but like… think there’s any others?”

“Besides us and Harrington?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re not gonna get a girlfriend in backwater, Indiana, Buckley.”

She smiled a little. “Guess not.”

Billy thought a little about what she’d asked. 

“Even if there are more, they probably don’t know.”

“Makes sense. I didn’t know ‘til I was sixteen.”

“Last year?”

“Like maybe a year and a half ago?”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.”

Billy ran a hand over where his hair should be. Even after a month and change he still did that sometimes. 

“I think I was twelve when I figured it out.” He offered.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Middle school locker rooms will do that to you.”

“Dude!” Robin turned more toward him. “I have to take PE again next year and I’m already panicking about it.”

Billy started laughing.

“It’s scary shit!” She laughed a little too, obviously trying not to.

“It is, you’re not wrong.”

The next round of silence was more comfortable. They both stared into the rippling neon blue of the lighted water. 

“Billy?”

“Yeah?”   
“Do you ever... just like… fucking hate yourself?” 

“All the time.”

“Do you think it ever goes away?”

Billy was quiet for a bit. “Dunno.”

“God, I hope it does. I don’t wanna feel like this forever.”

“It’s why we drink, Buckley.”

She giggled. 

“I get why Steve had such a thing for you.” Billy said. He sounded sad.

“It wasn't ‘such a thing’.” Robin remembered hearing Steve mumble ‘Been out of the game too long,’ Almost to himself. But didn't Nancy dump him in November? He had shrugged Robin off. 

“It was just a thing for like, a couple days.” She continued. “And he was rebounding. Hard. He hit on every girl that came into Scoops. I kept track. I was kinda confused as to why he just started trying so hard at the beginning of that week. Like, he’s charming and whatever, but girls who flirted back before that he just, like, politely dodged.”

Billy didn’t respond at all. 

“Was that ‘cause of you?”

“He’s probably trying to play it cool, in case anybody thought anything.”   
“Don’t know what I would do if anyone found out.”

“Try not to think about it.”

“I think about it constantly, like, what would my parents say?”

“Your parents love you, Robin.”

Robin was quiet. Steve had probably told Billy about her parents, but it was more Billy using her first name that stayed her. His voice got more… level. In a bad way.

“My dad fucking hates me.”   
“That’s not true-” Robin said immediately.

“See, people say that because they don’t want to believe that parenthood can work like that, but it can. And it does.”

Robin thought about it. 

“Do you hate him?”   
Billy chuckled. “Yeah. And no. That’s the really fucked up part. I wanted him to like me for so long. I didn’t decide it didn't matter, either, I just gave up trying.”

Robin studied Billy for a second.

“I’m gonna hug you.” She said finally.

“What? Buckley, no.”

“Yep. It’s happening. Oh, and it’s happened.” She hugged him, not tight enough to hurt, just tight enough that he would have to make an effort to escape. 

“I could kill you.”   
“So could a lego. You’re not special.”

Without warning, Billy wrapped an arm around her waist and made as if to throw her into the pool. 

Robin shrieked and then clapped a hand over her own mouth, very aware that it was the middle of the night.

“You can’t throw me in it’ll mess up my hair!” She hissed.

“No it wont you're just a pussy.” Billy let her go and pushed himself back into the water, standing waist deep in the shallow. 

“Like you know anything about hair.” Robin folded her arms.

“Sure I do. This girl I dated when I was a freshman dyed her hair blue like every other week. She still went to the beach. That’s worse than a motel pool.”

“Do many people have dyed hair in California?”

“A decent amount.”

“Ever dye yours?

“Not my scene.” Billy reached out his hands. “Get in the pool, Buckley.”

“No.” Robin ignored him. “What’s your scene?” 

“Dunno. Pissed off surfers, maybe.”

Robin laughed. “Mine’s definitely just nerds.”

“Oh, I can tell.” 

“What gave it away?” 

“The big words, for one. And Steve told me you speak like three languages or something. Nerd stuff.”

“Steve talks about me?”

“Sure.”

“What's he say?” 

“Get in the pool, and I’ll tell you.”

“That’s coercion.”

“Big words for a little girl.”

“How dare you!” She grinned.

“Just stand in it. You don’t have to go under.”

“Why do you want me too so bad, anyway?”

“Dunno. Fun to mess with people, and you're pretty high strung.”

Robin huffed a little. “I am not high strung.”

“Whatever you say.”

Robin was fine getting her clothes wet. It was just pajamas- shorts and an old band t shirt, but she hesitated. 

“What if I drown?” More stubborn excuses. 

“You won’t. I’m a certified lifeguard, remember?”

Robin gingerly let herself down the side of the pool, gritting her teeth for a cold that never cam, and feeling her feet against the tiled bottom. 

“Wow, look at you.”

“Shut up.” She put her hands down, feeling the water slightly warmer than the night air. “Tell me what Steve says about me.”

“All kinds of stuff. How cool he thinks you are, because he-”

“Has no idea what cool is, right?” 

“Nah, because he really cares about you.”

  
  


Robin bobbed up and down a little on her feet in the water. She hadn't been in water in ages. It was kind of nice, warm, gliding. She remembered something Steve had said about Billy being basically semi-aquatic.

“He really cares about you, too.” She said. 

Billy looked at her. 

“Steve, I mean. He really cares about you.”

Billy tensed, she could see it. Mostly because boys were super easy to read. 

“You don’t have to be nice to me, you know. Just because-”   
“I’m not being nice. Anyone will tell you I’m not particularly nice.”

“Yeah, me neither.”

“I’m being honest.” 

Billy met her gaze. He was kinda really intimidating. But I mean, Robin had been interrogated by commies, this was nothing.

“You’re braver than me, then.”

“What?”

“Being honest takes being really brave, or being really stupid. And you’re not stupid, Buckley.”

Robin was taken aback. “Thanks, I guess.”   
“Yeah, you're welcome.”

“Did he tell you much about me?” Billy asked, not looking at her again, after a pause.

“Jesus, he wouldn't shut up about you.”

“Ha!” Billy bounced in the water a little, like he was lighting up. “He tell you about the time I made he laugh when he was drinking a beer and bud lite came out his nose?”

“No! God that’s gross.” Robin laughed. 

“Oh it was but it was cute as hell, too.”

“He has such a stupid laugh.” Robin crinkled her nose. 

“ _ Oh _ yeah.”

They took it in turns mimicking Steve’s full laugh until they themselves were in hysterics.

Robin went under for all of half a second before popping back up and shaking her head, saying she hated water pressure in her ears, and Billy told her she’d hate the ocean. 

She called him a liar for saying her hair would be fine, watching it bleed light pink into the water.

“Worth it though, right?”

“How?”

“Oh come on, how many times are you gonna be in a motel pool at 1 am in Kansas? Never again, probably. Live a little.”

It was pretty fun, she had to admit. 

Even after they had to get out and say goodnight and she had to walk back up the stairs convinced she’d get frostbite from the cold and wet, it was fun. To be awake past midnight and not be in danger. To change into dry clothes and towel her hair off, staining the poor motels’ linens pink. To get back into bed where Steve was completely sprawled in a new position that made her have to physically pick up and move his arm without waking him up so she could lay down. Which worked this time around, he stayed asleep. 

She hugged his one free arm with both her own. 

He was always warmer than her. 

She fell back asleep.

  
  



	5. Talk To Me/Don't Talk To Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TUUUURN AROUND BRIIIIGHT EYES  
Also the car Steve wants is just the convertible my grandfather has, a 1980 Mercedes-Benz 450SL Classic, so you can look it up if you want! It's a purdy car

Repacking the edges of the car the following morning, Billy noticed Max quieter than usual. Might be him making something out of nothing, but he’d gotten very protective of Max in the past couple of months. Not like he was trying to parent her, or anything. Billy had decided long ago he was never  _ ever _ having kids. Bad idea on all fronts. Besides, he’d probably be a terrible father, lord knows he didn’t have any decent references. So he wasn't parenting Max by checking up on her. 

Just, you know, nothing might be something.

Billy put a hand on Max’s shoulder. 

“You ok?” He asked her.

“Yeah.” Max nodded, looking up at him, squinting a little in the sunlight.

“Like,” Billy gestured vaguely. “Ok-ok?”

“Yeah, I am.”

Billy nodded. “Good.”   
“Thanks.” She squeezed his hand off her shoulder. 

Good.

None of them had really eaten anything substantial since yesterday, so Max orchestrated a breakfast sponsored by Hostess.

“Max, you can’t have twinkies for breakfast.” Billy grabbed the second one out of her hands. 

“Why?” Max said through a mouthful of cake and cream. 

“Because that’s fucking dumb. You’re gonna get a headache.”

“Yesterday, you said it didn’t matter if we got good food-”

“That’s for snacks. This is for fuel.”

“Oh my god don’t call actual food  _ fuel _ .”

“ _ Oh my god _ ,” Billy mimicked. “We’ll get Denny’s or something.”

“Right, because pancakes are better than twinkies.”

So, tired of drive-thrus and gas station hot dogs, and with financial approval, they stopped at a Denny’s in far western Kansas. 

“Lot of tumbleweeds,” Steve remarked, staring out the window.

“And racists!” Robin bounced into her seat at the booth beside him. “Very exciting.” 

“If I get two burgers will you make fun of me? I want to know now so I can prepare.”

“ _ Two _ burgers?” Robin teased.

“Got it.” Steve turned back to the table. “So how’s everyone's day so far?”

“Fine. Bored out of my mind,” Max ate a piece of ice from her water with a fork. “But I got to talk shit about high school with Robin.”

“I’m fun!” Robin announced, shaking her now-pinkish hair forward.

“Do you feel more prepared for high school, Max?” Steve propped his chin up on his hand.

“Yeah, thanks mom.”

“Next he’s gonna ask us if everyone’s been drinking enough water,” Billy mumbled.

“Hey, hydration is important.”

Steve didn’t get two burgers, he got a burger and a stack of flapjacks and Robin asked him where the fuck all the food he ate went.

“To his hair, probably.”

Max threatened to stab Billy with a fork if he didn't stop eating her pancakes after finishing his own and he just laughed.

Max complained briefly about Mike and the boys, and then got kinda quiet-sad. 

“I promise you’ll see them again.” Robin leaned forward across the table. 

“Yeah, I know.” Max sighed. “It just sucks. I’m gonna miss you guys.”

“Well you got three more days with these losers.” Billy shoved her shoulder a little. 

That stuck with Steve. 

_ Three days. _

And only two hours passed in the car before Billy grabbed Steve’s shoulder to get his attention

“Woah, wait. We’re in Colorado.” 

“Yeah, we just passed the sign-” Steve started.

“No, Steve,” Billy leaned farther forward. “We’re in Colorado. Like where the drinking age is still 18.”

“OH SHIT.” Steve lit up. “Robin, find the nearest liquor store!”

“Ok, one,” Robin started.,“You have to keep being able to drive. Two, Max and I are both minors. And three, we’re on a goddamn budget!”   
“I know but Robin, this is important.”

“How is this import-”

“Buckley, listen to me.” Billy stopped her, charm turned up. “Not to play the ‘I died’ card, but I died. I’m basically a Make-A-Wish kid. And now, here I am, in picturesque Colorado, 18 and alive, and you’re really gonna deny me my right, nay, my responsibility, to buy booze?”   
“Yes,” Robin replied. 

“Steve still hasn’t taught me how a keg works.” Max chimed in. 

“I did say I would do that.”

“Please don’t contribute to the delinquency of my kid sister, Harrington.” Billy gave him a look.

“Right, because that’s your job now.”

“I’m glad we understand each other.”

They found an only mildly sketchy liquor store, and Robin made fun of both boys for acting like kids in a candy shop.

Steve was walking the aisles absent-mindely, deciding even a mini keg would be too expensive and just explaining the process to Max verbally, Billy cutting in to correct him a couple of times. 

“There’s more than one right way to-” Steve was saying

“Steve, why are you holding the mini keg like a baby?” Robin said, walking up behind him.

Steve looked back at her blankly. “...Because he’s my baby.”

“_Your_ _baby_?” Robin started giggling.

“Yeah. Robin, meet Kegory, my firstborn son.” Steve ran with it, more goofy confidence in his tone.

Billy barked a laugh. “Kegory?”

“Yeah. Like Gregory- greg. Kegory- keg.”

Robin gasped, mock enthused. “Does that make me his auntie?”   
“Duh.” Steve struggled to keep a straight face. 

“Sweet baby Keg,” Robin cooed. “So noble of you, Steve, being a single father.”

“Right?”

“You’re all so weird.” Max took the keg from Steve, shoving it back onto its shelf.

“You think I’d be a good dad?” Steve asked Robin when they’d finally gone back to the car, having bought only an indecently large bottle of vodka and a pack of wine coolers. 

“Don’t answer that.” Billy cut her off. “He’s gonna launch into his back and forth about how much he wants kids.”

“What?” Steve felt his cheeks go hot. “I- what? No.”

“Everyone knows Steve wants kids.” Max rolled her eyes. “He forcibly adopted the party soon as he got the chance.”

“He’d probably be a good dad.” Robin thought about it.

“Oh, for sure,” Max opened the wrapper of a candy bar with her teeth. “He’s almost died for us like, eight times.”

“Stop encouraging him.” Billy tilted his head back against the window of the back seat.

“How many kids do you want?” Robin asked innocently, ignoring Billy.

“Not that I’ve thought about it.” Steve started “But probably four, because like, two means I might just have two boys and I really want a girl but then I don't want any of them to feel left out-”   
“Oh god, forget I asked.” Robin laughed. 

Billy really should have not said anything. He shouldn't have leaned back into Steve so quickly. But he wanted to… reclaim parts of him. Like touching his shoulder, or talking over Robin to get his attention. Little things that let him pretend Steve was still his in some capacity, he still had some claim to Steve’s time, his gaze, his presence. 

He’d gotten too close with that kids comment though. Steve had told him about how much he wanted kids one night they’d been drinking on Steve’s roof- which was a very bad idea, but everything they did together was one big thrilling and wonderful bad idea. The ones that made you feel like someone real and worthy of that title: alive. 

Steve was gushing about being a father someday, laying on his back on the steep decline of the roof while Billy had leaned over him and methodically picked up every lock of his hair and placed it back away from his face, or tucked it behind his ear, just to look at Steve better while he spoke. 

And Steve was going to be an excellent father someday. Billy could just picture it, Steve in a picturesque house with a picturesque wife and a herd of children and normal all-american happiness that would be the finishing touches of his perfect and picturesque all american life. 

Billy would just be a blip in his youth. The story behind the phrase “I did some pretty crazy stuff when I was your age” that he could tell his kids to make them feel better about getting detention or something.

So why was Steve helping him run away?

Steve kept thinking about the shoulder touch. About Billy grabbing his shoulder, familiar, excited, to talk to him. And how easy it had been to talk for those moments in the liquor store, and after in the parking lot. God he just wanted that back. Which was stupid and impossible and also a bad fucking idea because Billy did not want him. He’d made that abundantly clear. It just… it didn’t seem like it. 

It seemed, you know, sometimes, like they were still… them. Still together. 

But probably because Steve was dumb and didn’t pick up on social cues or whatever. He usually didn’t fully understand things people were like, hinting at unless they explained them, so of course try not to assume, but I mean, Billy probably… he didn’t even know what Billy probably thought. 

He used to. 

Deep in Colorado, where no one else should be except four teenagers on a runaway road trip, a ford with Kansas plates passed them. 

Max punched Billy in the shoulder “Kansas.”

Billy looked up. “Oh is that what we’re doing? Ok.”

Fifteen minutes later. “Nebraska” Billy punched Max back. 

“That was so fast how’d you even read it?” She protested. 

“Trust me, Maxie.” He put his hand up as if making an oath. 

Ten minutes.

“Wyoming.”

Twelve.

“Kansas, again.”

They went through the outskirts of a city. 

“New Mexico!” Robin joined in, getting Steve. 

“Hey don’t punch me I’m driving-“

“Another New Mexico.” Billy cut him off with a hit to the shoulder. 

“Nebraska!”

“Ooh, Utah. That’s Suzie-land.”

“Who in the hell drove here from Alabama?”

“Kansas!”

“You’re all going to have bruises if this lasts the rest of the trip.”

“Shut up, Steve.”

_ Talk to me/don’t talk to me. _

It was easy to forget how hard it was. 

They ran out of gas. It wasn't exactly Steve’s fault, it was just that there was a gas station when they had a quarter tank and he figured there be another one before they ran out. There wasn't. But there was in less than a mile, they just couldn't push the car that far.

No one was particularly stressed about it, including Billy, which he surprised himself about. They were far enough away from Hawkins that he wasn't worried about having to turn back. They were just past halfway to California. They just had to get there. 

Steve had one of those red tank things all car owners are supposed to have but no one actually did. Except for ever-prepared Steve Harrington.

Who could walk to the gas station? 

Both boys offered but they couldn't leave the girls alone. 

“Both of us have faced scarier than whetever’s in Colo-fucking-rado-” Max defended.

“It’s just like, a bad idea.” Steve said through a mouthful of almonds- he got the most boring snacks. 

So Steve and Robin stayed, and Max and Billy walked the 0.83 miles to the gas station. Robin measured with a ruler from Steve’s glove compartment - what didn’t he have?

Should Billy really be walking that far-

Yes Steve, he could walk just fine.

“But what about-”

“Jesus, I’m not a fucking invalid, Steve.”

Billy just wanted to feel  _ useful. _

Billy and Max were pretty good at making conversation by this point, they’d talked near constantly when he’d been in the hospital. He probably would have gone completely stir crazy otherwise.

Max was talking about the party- she always called them that. She said something about sneaking around and Billy cut her off, surprising himself a little even.

“I should have said something.”

“What?’ She looked sideways at him.

“To your friends. I should have, dunno, apologised or something.”

“Billy, you weren’t yourself-”

“Not that. About before. Especially Lucas. I should have said something.”

Max didn’t reply right away. “Thanks, Billy.”

He just nodded, kept walking.

“Billy?”

“Yes, Maxine?”   
“Gross.” She grimaced at him. “I have an important question.”

“Sure.”

“Do…” She stared at the road in front of her. “Do you remember the sauna?”

Billy paused. He didn’t know how to answer her, mostly because he didn’t have the full answer. But he should try, he knew he should try.

“...sort of.”

“Did… when I… was I talking to you? Could you, like, hear me?”

“I think.”

“You don’t know?”

Billy shook his head. 

“I just…” Max started. Her voice dipped a little. “I don’t know if I should have tried harder to talk to you… if that would have helped.”

Billy turned, and Max was crying. She was trying not to, but the more she blinked, the more tears fell. 

“Woah, woah.” Billy, stopped, grabbed her shoulders. “Don’t cry. Max, don’t cry.”

“I can’t just  _ stop _ crying, dumbass.” She hiccuped. 

“I know, I just- I don’t know what I’m supposed to  _ do _ .”

“Comfort me, maybe?” 

“How-”

“Just do whatever you think Steve would do.” Max laughed a little.

Billy might have laughed too, but that wasn't bad advice. He thought about it for a second.

“Max, this… this isn't your fault.”

“I should have  _ tried _ -”   
“No. You should keep yourself safe. You should always keep yourself safe. No matter what, that’s what I want you to do, ok?”   
She nodded.

“Ok.” Billy said again, almost to himself.

He pulled her head against his chest. She hugged him. 

“I don’t think anyone could have done anything.” Billy spoke again after a second.

“El did.”

“She’s like, superhuman or whatever.”

“Wish I was superhuman.” Max said to that, almost a whisper. 

“Well, you’re not.”

She laughed. “Gee, thanks.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome.”

They kept walking. They got gas. They walked back, taking turns lugging the little red tank, talked about other things. Nicer things.

Everyone was poised at the Colorado-Utah border to start getting one another for Colorado plates. Four states down, three to go.

They used the small amount of gas to just get to the gas station. Everyone had to use the bathroom anyway. And this gas station had everyone’s favorite- an attached 7Eleven. 

Robin and Max loaded up on junk food, Steve got gas, and Billy stretched his legs, which helped with the general pain of having to exist in such a dinged-up body but getting back in the car was hell. Billy winced audibly.

“Hey, you ok?” Steve ducked back into the car.

“Yeah, it’s nothing.”

“Dude,” Steve looked doubtful. 

“Just hurts. Nothing major, or-”

“Oh, we can fix that.” Steve sat up.

“What? No, Steve-”

“Be right back don’t move.” Steve pointed at him and then clambered out of the car. Billy looked over his shoulder to see the trunk open and could hear Steve rummaging around.

Then he came running back over, with the entire and unopened bottle of vodka, unscrewed the cap, and poured a decent amount of it into the rest of the slurpee robin had brought him.

“This,” He handed it to Billy, “is for you.”

“You know drinking makes painkillers like, super gnarly.”

“Yeah, that’s what you want, right?”

Billy shrugged. He knocked some of the spiked slurpee back. 

“Steve, this is disgusting.”

“Thank you, I invented it.”

“Is he trying to pretend he invented putting vodka in slurpees?” Robin cut in, sliding back into the backseat with Max, who threw a bag of chips at Billy’s head. 

“Thanks, Max.”

“Yeah no problem.”   
“I’m the first person you  _ know _ , to have-” Steve tried but Robin cut him off.

“Someone else did it first! Indisputable fact.”

So the nature of invention was the topic that carried them out of the state. 

Billy had to actively draw himself away from Steve. Little moments like that could  _ not _ keep happening, not now. It was getting too easy to talk to him, to see him, to think about him. Easier than it was before, even. Because no one was around, they were so far away from anywhere that mattered-

_ Keep your distance. _

They hit Utah, but didn’t get far. The gas set them back. The looked for somewhere, anywhere, really to stay, and they found an inn. 

It was cute, with one of those gates framed with roses and mounted deer and rabbit heads on the walls inside which kinda grossed Max out but she wasn't gonna say that. 

Steve hopped up to the desk looking particular haggard from a mixture of sleep deprivation and a bajillion hours of driving, but still well dressed so they suspected the receptionist took pity on them. She was pretty apologetic.

“We only have one room available, but it’s a double one. See, we have a wedding this weekend.”

Sure enough, a banner with gold calligraphy, hanging over the double doors to a tiny ballroom on the bottom floor read:

_ Shannon and Christopher’s Big Day _

“Congrats to Shannon and Christopher,” Robin said when they’d grabbed the bare minimum from the car. They had to climb three flights of stairs to the last room, split into two chambers, each with a bed that barely fit.

“I’m calling it.” Billy dropped his backpack with a thud. “This place is haunted.”

“Serious Shining vibes, right?” Max folded her arms. 

Billy nodded. “We should just hang out downstairs, explore the weird taxidermy.”

“Ok, but, you know, there’s a wedding reception starting right now,” Steve sat in one of the wicker chairs to crack his back. “So maybe we find something else to do.”

“What else is there at 7pm in a small town in Utah?” 

“Could be fun. We could dress up.” Robin sat on the arm of Steve’s chair. 

“With what?”

“Anything we have.”

“And we have pregame material,” Billy pointed out.

“Ok, but it’s their special day! They don’t want some grimey teens wandering around-”

“I personally would be very disappointed if grimey teens  _ didn’t _ crash my wedding. Keys.” Billy stuck his hand out. 

Steve handed them over.

“Does this mean I can have wine coolers?” Max sat up.

“You can have  _ one _ . Otherwise the sugar will make you sick.” Billy pointed at her before running back out to the car to sneak in alcohol. 

Robin and Max set to finding out which of their clothes were most wedding presentable and Billy came back with booze and Steve put on MTV and an hour was spent like that almost as if they weren't running away. Almost as if they were normal teens. Almost as if nothing was wrong. 

When they finally got down to the wedding reception, it was in full swing. Maybe forty or fifty adults in sunday best were collected in the miniature ballroom/dining room eating cake and drinking champagne while a mix of top 40 and cheesy 70s hits played ever so slightly too loud in the background.

It was absolutely fantastic.

Billy immediately stole someone’s expensive cocktail from an unattended table. Max and Robin took turns going back around the snack table to steal as many chocolate covered strawberries as was socially acceptable at once. Steve picked out a table closer to the back of the room where they had a fighting chance of not being singled out as wedding crashers, and they people watched enthusiastically. This might have been the most exciting thing any of them had done in ages that wasn't a life or death situation. The room smelled like roses and alcohol and more perfumes than should be allowed and the chatter of people, the buzz of a shot or two, and thrum of stereo kept everyone in good spirits. 

“I like the blue and white color palette,” Steve was half shouting over the music. “But I question the choice of ONLY white flowers. Makes the blue seem, like, tacked on-”

“Oh my god, Steve.” Robin interrupted him. “Dont be fucking gay.”

Steve stopped, completely unsure of what to say.

Robin stayed serious for maybe two more seconds before cracking when Billy snorted. She started laughing hysterically.

“Do you get it? Cause? We’re- you know?” She managed.

“You should see your face, man.” Billy laughed.

“I don’t think anyone’s ever called me gay before.” Steve realized. 

“I’ve called you gay before.” Billy said. 

“That does not count.”

Max came back with more strawberries. 

“So are appetizers we stole from a wedding our dinner plan, then?” Robin asked. 

“Sound fine to me” Max grinned.

They only took one piece of cake. Mostly because it was lackluster in quality but also because they didn't want to be rude.

At one point an older couple walked past their table, glancing at the suspiciously. Billy covered by loudly playing at being wedding guests

“So happy for these crazy kids.” Billy smiled casually, putting his arm over Robin’s shoulders. “I remember, you know, back in college, Ol’ Chris was a real party animal. Glad Shannon's mellowed him out.”

Robin muffled her giggles into her champagne, which just made her spill a little of it, which led to more giggling.

“Take it easy, Buckley.”

“You take it easy.” She was saying when Steve grabbed her arm.

“Robin! Robin! It’s Tammy!”   
“What?” She was still laughing a bit.

“Listen!”

Robin stopped a listen and gasped at the distinct beginning notes of  _ Total Eclipse of the Heart.  _

“We have to go!”

“We have to.” Steve stood up, holding out a hand to help Robin up but she just grabbed it and ran, dragging Steve with her, to the dancefloor. 

It was late enough and packed enough that Billy was less concerned about being caught and felt more free to chat, leaning up against the back wall, with Max about her thoughts on weddings, she’d only ever been to one other one, he thoughts on the various kinds of alcohol she’d tried, and something about the Beach Boys but Billy stopped paying attention when he shot a glance towards the dancefloor and saw Steve.

Steve, illuminated by tacky blue and pink light on the dancefloor, smiling open mouthed, grabbing Robin’s hand, laughing. His stupid hair bounced when he jumped, Billy could amost pick the soudn of his laugh out of the crowd, under the music. 

Fuck, there it was again. The old familiar feeling he didn’t want to name, absolutely refused to name. The feeling of staring at pretty boy Steve Harrington and thinking he’d do anything to get close to him again. Even being in a car for god knows how many hours together, even talking in short exchanges, even cracking the occasional joke, Steve was so far away from him. It might not have been the worst thing, Billy was used to keeping his distance from boys he cared more about than another boy should, but he knew what it was like to be close. He knew what it was like to be close to Steve Harrington, be near and dear to him. The terrible taste in music, the excellent taste in stoned junk-food concoctions, the way his breath smelled like when he woke up in the morning, what he tasted like at night. 

All that was ages away.

So far away.

Billy realized Max was staring at him

“Don’t look at me like that,” Billy pulled a face at her.

“I’m not.”

“Yes you are, don’t even.”

“You're being paranoid, Billy. I’m just sitting here, minding my own business, watching you stare off into the distance at you know, obviously nothing and no one.”

“Max, don’t be a bit-”

“You said if you ever called me a bitch again I got to hit you for it.”

Billy sighed “I did say that.”

“I’m not trying to be lame, anyway.” Max swung her legs. “Just seems like you’re not happy.”

“I’m never happy.”

“Bull-shit.” Max snorted. “I've seen you happy.” She nodded her head in Steve’s direction.

“You’re a  _ kid- _ ”

“And you’re a teenager.”

“Don’t get into it with me about this Max.”

“I’m not trying to!” She hopped up and stood next to him, looking up, direct, smiling a little. “I’m just observing.” 

“Well stop, ok?”

“Sure.” She smiled innocently.

“I should just leave you here, in Utah.” Billy smiled a little himself, letting up. “Think you could survive? Middle-of-fucking-nowhere, take two.”

“I could do it.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, fucking try me.” She grabbed his arm, they walked to the growing mass of wedding goers dancing.

“With nothing? Or with like, supplies.”

“What do I get with supplies?”

“Pick any three things in the car.”

“Twenty bucks, a snickers bar, and Steve’s bat.”

Billy laughed. 

A slow dance was playing when they got to the middle of the dancefloor. Max stood on Billy’s shoes, he kept her balanced pulling on her hands. She was almost too tall for it, but whenever the two of them started a thing it was like a challenge. It was fun to stand on steel toed boots anyway, and it reminded Max of being a little kid, standing on her dad’s dress shoes and waltzing around the living room. She might have gotten sad, thinking about it too much, but Billy pretended to drop her and she shrieked and he laughed. It didn’t help to think about people she didn’t have anymore. It helped to have Billy.

As soon as people started leaving so did the four of them, for fear of getting caught, but also for mild to severe exhaustion.

The inn they were staying at was actually probably exploration worthy if they had time or daylight or energy, but it sufficed to grab a few more appetizers from the reception and hide out in a guest drawing room with a bunch of weird taxidermy and sink-y couches. Billy decided he liked fireplaces, something he’d never bothered to have an opinion about before now, but it was warm and made for good white noise and it added to the warm feeling of being buzzed- on champagne of all things. 

Steve was throwing a grape up in the air to catch in his mouth. He did it, raising his hands in small triumph. 

“Wow, you’re a god among men.” Robin popped a grape in her mouth normally, without throwing it.

“Thank you, Robin. I am.”

Billy laughed a little. 

Max fell asleep on his shoulder. He found himself pushing her hair back out of her face. He didn’t really think about what he was thinking, he just thought it. 

Max was tough as nails. Billy knew he’d been through some shit, especially now, but he had to recognise the same kind of unkillable nature in Max. The same kind of ‘fuck-with-me’ attitude. But she was less jaded. Maybe because she was younger. But maybe she was just like that- innately good. 

He was proud of her. 

He’d tell her that sometime. That was the thing you were supposed to say to kids; _ “I’m proud of you. You’re doing alright.” _

“Max.”

She yawned awake. 

“You should go to bed,” He said to her.

“So should you,” She mumbled back.

“I can take her.” Robin stood up, stretching her arms over her head. “I’m about to pass out anyway.”

Robin coaxed Max up. They left. And Billy was left staring at Steve, who was reading over the now-beat up and scribbled on map on the floor, a shittily embroidered pillow crushed up under his arms.

The whole room smelled like dust and cedar. Billy could hear the faint strains of one last song from the tiny ballroom, guests trickling out, back up to their rooms.

Billy rolled himself up off the couch to drag his own pillow down next to Steve. 

“Oh hello,” Steve said to him, looking over.

Billy just raised his eyebrows in response.

“What happened to avoiding me?”

“I’m drunk, I can’t avoid anyone.”

“You’re not drunk, I’ve seen you drink way more than this.”

“I’m also fucking wiped.”

“Me too.” Steve laughed a little. 

Neither spoke for a second.

“I should be dead.” Billy said suddenly.

“What do you mean?” Steve put his pencil down. 

“I’m at a wedding in Utah with you-” Whoops, shit. “-and Max-” Smooth recovery. “On my way home, and I should probably be dead.”

“I mean, so should I.”

“But you didn’t actually die, Steve.”

“Yeah, I know that.”

Billy was quiet for a bit.

“What do you want to do now?” Steve folded the map over.

“What?”

“Like, since you’re not dead. What do you want from your life?”

“Why do you ask such fucking existential questions.”

“Who said I’m not drunk?”   
“You're not.”

“Well I want kids.” Steve offered. “Oh, and a convertible Mercedes. White. But like, kids are number one.”

“You’re so fucking weird.”

“C’mon, you gotta want something.”

Billy did want something. Quite a few things, actually. 

Before, or when he was younger, he played with the idea of being famous surfer, or a rockstar or something. But for a while he didn’t know what he wanted, he was too angry to ask things of himself. 

Then he died. 

And now, what did he want?

He wanted a dog. Like, a boxer, maybe. Or a bulldog. One of the ones that could scare people but would be all soft and sweet when you gave it treats. 

And he wanted a house. A house that he owned where no one ever broke things over his head, where he never got angry enough to break things himself, and where there was always food and a really fancy record player and he could mow the lawn on Sundays or work on whatever nice car he’d buy himself when he had enough money or go surfing again and a neighborhood bar he could go to where everyone knew his name and said it like they were happy to see him and someone, another person he never thought too hard on, who would say his name in a way no one else ever could, and they could share his house and his car and his dog. They could share all the nice things he wanted out of life, maybe they’d want nice things too.

That’s what he wanted. 

But he didn’t say all that.

“I want a dog.” He said.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”   
“What kind of dog?” Steve yawned a little.

“Dunno.”

Steve nodded “Cool.” Then, “I might want a boxer, if I got a dog…”

Of course. Billy looked over at Steve, who was talking and gesturing, wide and sure, just talking. Because Steve liked talking to Billy. He’d said that before.

“... But like, you can’t get a dog right when you have kids, that’s too much. Too much to take care of. You know Nancy had a dog when she was young and her mom told me it was like, a lot to deal with…”

Billy liked to listen.

“You good?” Steve noticed Billy not paying full attention.

“Yeah.” Billy didn’t really know why he stopped. Just to look back at Steve, maybe.

The fire backlit Steve’s hair, like a halo. Of course like a stupid halo. It outlined his face in such a specific way, like his nose that had been broken twice now, and the little scar under his lower lip that was new and every mole across his face and eyes and how dark they were in such a warm way, like how could dark be warm?

“Neitehr of us can catch a fucking break, huh.” Steve pulled a hand through his hair, breaking the halo. 

“Yeah,” Billy looked over the highway. “I guess not.”

“You’re getting to California.” Steve said, voice steady.

It was like Steve had read his mind.

“If it’s the last thing I do.”

Billy looked at Steve, who for once, was looking right back at him.

“Thank you.”

Steve smiled.

He was so far away. 

Billy was forced to remember laying on the floor of Steve’s basement, drunk like this, talking like this, but not exactly like this, because Steve’s hand had been in his, and drinking and talking always turned into kissing back then. 

Right now, in this stupid, fucked up verion of reality that shouldnt even be happening, Steve stood up, getting even farther away.

“Night,” He smiled smaller.

“Night, Harrington.”

Steve laughed a little. He walked away.

Billy got to bed a bit after. Max was already conked out in the front end of the two connected rooms. 

Billy fell asleep probably around 2am, thinking over and over of the moment Steve turned his head and smiled in the firelight. 

Over and over. 

Steve really did a great job of playing it cool before running up to the weird half-double room and saying hi to a half asleep mMax and shutting the door behind him to say:

“Robin.” 

Robin put her book down on the bed next to her. “Yes?”

“I’ve been thinking.”

“Did it hurt?” 

“You know how you told me to think about my feelings?” He waved her off. “And like, talk about them?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ve been thinking, about… me. And my, you know, feelings. And how I feel. About… things.”

“Is things Billy?”   
Steve opened his mouth, then closed it again before saying. “Uh, yeah.”

“You still have feelings for him. You gonna tell him?”

“No.” Steve looked alarmed. “Well… wait, no. Bad- bad idea.”

“Why is it a bad idea?”   
“Because he’s- you know? And I’m all like- like, aah. And it’s just- you know. Yeah,” Steve finished, setting his hands on his hips. 

“You’re very articulate.”

“Just, trust me. Bad idea.”

“Because…?”

“Because I don’t know how I feel exactly just that I  _ have _ feelings!”   
“Ok,” Robin sat up a little more. “Describe these feelings to me.”

“Like how?”

“Like,” Robin rolled her hand. “Happy, sad, romantic, sexual, whatever.”   
“But like, that’s weird!”   
“It’s not weird, Steve.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because you feel this way, and I feel this way, and so do a million other people, and even if people say it’s weird, it’s not.”

“I told you that the one time you cried about it in the Burger King parking lot and you said it didn’t matter-”

“Right, because I was having a breakdown-”

“I’m having a breakdown!”   
“But it  _ is _ normal and you need to hear that.”

Steve fell forward onto the bed.

“You are  _ such _ a drama queen.” Robin told him.

“I’m struggling.”

“Yeah,” She pushed his hair back. “I get it.”

He sat back up.

“Tell me.” She raised her eyebrows at him.

“It’s like…” Steve tried to articulate. “I see him, and I get really happy. But then I think about it, and I’m really sad and also like, kind of pissed off?”

“Makes sense. He did, like, totally break your heart.”

“Yeah. Just… I don’t know.”

Robin looked at him for a second, before leaned back onto the bed beside him. 

“I really do know how you feel,” She told him.

“Because of Tammy?”

“Yep.” She smiled sadly at the ceiling. 

“I’m really sorry about that.” Steve said.

“Why?”

“I wish I could have like, redirected her attention your way.”

Robin laughed. “Yeah, me too.”

They lay in silence for a while. 

“We might not ever see each other again.” Steve said almost to himself.

More silence.

“You know,” Robin started. “When I liked Tammy, it felt, like, all consuming. Like I was dying in a way that forced me to be like, more alive. It was horrible but… you know, I loved it. In like a weird, guilty way I loved the feeling. I felt like a real person. Is it like that for you?”

Steve screwed his eyes shut, feeling like a child, helpless. “Yeah. It sucks.”

“But was it ever, like, amazing?”   
“Yes.” He admitted.

“I would have given anything to be with Tammy. Like, my right leg. Maybe an eye.”

Steve laughed.

“You think I’m kidding, I’m not kidding.”

“No, I know.”

“So, for as horrible as you feel,” She turned to him. “Would it be worth it, to say something to him, if you could feel that amazing again?”

Steve thought about it. 

He thought about how he’d felt, with Billy. 

The sneaking around. The big secret. The danger and the devotion. 

He might have hated it 

But he loved it. Every second of it.

He’d give anything to have it back, even for a day.

“He might hate me.”

“He might not.”

Steve was quiet again.

“You could always sleep on it.” Robin stopped his train of thought. “You have two more days, but, you know.”

“Yeah.” Steve said.

Sure. 

Sleep on it

Only he couldn't sleep. He could only think about Billy.

  
  



	6. Steve Takes a Nap

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's the only remarkable thing to happen in this chapter. Steve taking a nap.

“You know Billy’s a lot nicer than I expected him to be,” Robin said to Steve outside the car, the next morning.

“Yeah, well. He did die. Maybe that changed him or something.” Steve swung himself into the driver’s seat.

They slept in a bit, expecting easier driving. They got easier driving.

Utah was beautiful, especially in clear sunshine. Steve might have driven a little slower, and conversation was easier, because they were almost there, and Steve could pretend that everything was normal if he just didn’t think about the way Billy’s hair turned gold in light like this, and how any clarity sunshine may bring would never be as warm as Billy’s skin against his-

_ Shut up. _

Steve started counting Billy’s scars. Or at least the ones he could see. There were a dozen smaller ones that were nearly there now that had actually started healing, and that would eventually fade entirely, so Steve stuck with counting the major ones. 

One: the one on his cheekbone. 

Two: the one jagged line that split into two at the back of his head, the reason they had to cut his hair. 

Three: the one that spread out across his left forearm, little tendrils of it tracing down his wrist, up his elbow. 

Four: the one just above his hip Steve had only seen the edge of when Billy had lifted an arm and his shirt had pulled away from his jeans. 

Five: the one Steve knew was there but had never seen. The one in the center of Billy’s chest, the big one. The one that snaked across his shoulder and went deeper than a scar should go. The one that had killed him. The one that meant he was still alive. 

Steve had noticed Billy touching light fingers to the center of his chest now and again, gingerly, or to his shoulder, wincing, and knew it wasn't totally healed, but was getting close what with all the government issued mystery drugs he’d gotten in the hospital. It must hurt though. Surreal to touch the place that had killed you. 

Steve knew he shouldn’t be counting Billy’s scars. One) it was weird and two) it meant a lot more staring at Billy than made sense for anything other than downright pining. And Steve was  _ not _ pining. He was observing. Observing very closely. Just to make sure Billy was ok. To see the extent of the damage. To think about running his thumb over the pale line of a scar that cut along Billy’s cheekbone, to press a hand to the center of Billy’s chest and wish for a way to take the hurt away and thinking- or who knows maybe even saying -how awful it was that anything could hurt Billy enough to leave a scar that big that deep that pearly white-

_ God, that’s  _ gay _ .  _

Steve was pulled from his train of thought by a rabbit darting across the road.

Steve wasn’t sleeping. This wasn’t exactly new, he never slept particularly well, but he was driving close to ten hours a day and hadn't gotten a full night’s sleep in a month. 

Even Billy could sleep, but Steve was on fucking guard all last night. Eyes open, unable to relax, wary of the slightest sound. Robin had taken to keeping contact with him while she herself slept, in case it would help. But even with Robin’s sweatshirt clad arm flopped across his chest, even listening to her breathe in the dim-warm light from the street lamp outside the inn, very aware that there was no immediate danger, he couldn't sleep.

Then he almost hit a rabbit.

He slammed on the breaks and startled everyone in the car including the poor rabbit. 

Steve had to call it.

“I need sleep.”

“Yeah,” Robin half-laughed sitting shotgun, breathless from surprise.

Steve let his head fall forward on the steering wheel. 

“Ok.” He sat back up. “Max?”

She looked up. “Yeah?”

“Have you gotten any better at driving?”

“Yeah?” She grinned a little.

He sighed very heavily. “Wanna drive?”

Max sat up straight to say “Hell yes I do.”

Just as Robin and Billy both started protesting,

“Why Max?”

“Billy said he couldn't drive!”

“Why can’t you drive, Buckley?”

“Do I look licensed to you?”

“I’ve driven his car before!” Max talked over them.

“When?” Robin and Billy both said.

“A time,” Steve sighed. “Look,” He turned over the shoulder of the front seat. “Max, I’m going to give you the keys, but never at any point are you allowed to go over the speed limit-”

“You’ve been going 15 miles over for the past hour!”   
“That’s because I’m a grown up.” 

“You certainly sound like a grown up.” Robin mumbled.

Steve waved her off. “If you wreck my car, Max? I’ll probably forgive you. So just please don’t, ok?”

“Ok.” She nodded solemnly.

“Great, because Daddy needs a nap. Switch!”

Steve hauled himself out of the driver’s seat and practically collapsed into the back. 

“Did you just call yourself daddy in the third person?” Max was pulling the seat forward so she could reach the pedals better.

“It’s a thing he does.” Robin sighed dramatically. 

“That’s just, deeply uncool.”

“Hey, I’m cool-” Steve tried.

“You saying that means you’re really not.”

“She’s got you there, Harrington.” Robin put her hand on his head when he leaned against her shoulder.

“Dustin thinks I’m cool-”

“You’re really helping your case here.” Billy turned over his shoulder.

“Ok, don’t just pick on Steve,” Max started the car, checking over her shoulder, shifting gears, pulling forward. 

“Thank you Max-”

“Yeah, none of you are cool.” She smiled.

Billy almost spoke, then stopped himself, trying to maintain ‘cool.’

“Cool is a social construct anyway-” Robin started.

“Ok now that’s uncool-” 

“Steve, go to sleep.” Billy interrupted him.

“Make me.” Steve sat up a little. “Wait. Don’t. I know you can.”

Billy laughed, short and low. “Yeah, not sure you want another concussion.”

“How many concussions have you had?” Robin asked him.

“Let’s count. One, football, ninth grade. Two, Jonathan, last year, but like, borderline.”

“Three.” Billy said, shooting a finger-gun Steve’s direction.

“Three,” Steve agreed.

“Four,” Robin held up a hand. “Being interrogated.”

“Also probably five at some point fighting the demo-dogs,” Max threw in.

“That’s also borderline.”   
“Three whole concussions is really bad, Steve,” Robin told him.

“Yeah,” He sighed. “Probably.”

“No, like, fact. That’s bad.”

He shrugged.

“Steve!”

“I mean I’m not dead, so, you know, bright side.”

“But brain damage?”

“Brain damage is real?” Max asked Billy. 

“Yeah. Probably why Steve’s so fucking stupid.”

“Steve’s not stupid.” Robin started. “He’s just… dumb.”

“Thank you for that, Robin.”

“Yeah you’re welcome.” She smiled.

“Oh my god Steve go to  _ sleep _ .”

  
  


Billy sort of expected to feel better the farther they got from Indiana. And he sort of did. There wasn’t the same level of paranoia and stress, but there was still what was starting to seem like the constant weight of being alive. Which, also, might have been fine. Like he was used to having to put effort into functioning like a normal person, but where the anxiety dropped off, he’d picked back up the old and terrible habit of fixating on Steve. Like, oh cool, you’re not near breakdown every other second? More time to think about how badly you fucked up the best thing that ever happened to you. 

Why couldn’t he just get over stuff?

It wasn't like it made any sense for them to be together right now anyway. If they hadn’t- if he hadn't broken it off, it might have been worse. Billy probably needed to be alone, recovering from dying, or even if he had died, Steve might have built him up to be someone he wasn’t. Because he wasn’t a good person. 

Even if Steve once told him he was a good boyfriend. 

Even if Max started thinking he was a good brother. 

They didn’t get it.

_ You’re isolating yourself again. _

Sure, that’s what he was always; isolated.

_ Not always. _

Billy sat up more, glancing over to Max, looking for something else. Anything else.

“Who taught you how to drive, anyway?”

“I did.”

“You can’t teach yourself to drive.”

“Sure you can, I would just stare at my mom, or you, or whoever, and figure out what they did when. Taught myself how to skate that way.”

Billy was mildly impressed, which was hard to do. “Smart kid.”   
Max looked sideways at him.

“Woah was that a compliment?”

“Alright, don’t let it get to your head-”

“Wow it’s almost like you care about me-”

“Fuck off, Max.”

“You fuck off!”   
“Both of you shut up or you’ll wake the baby.” Robin snapped her fingers between them. 

The baby, or course, was Steve, who was asleep in a very un-baby esque way, chin tipped back, mouth open, arm flopped over the seat edge. He might have been snoring.

“Doubt anything could wake him right now.” Billy mused.

Steve had fallen asleep within seconds of actually shutting up and closing his eyes, and Billy could see him just barely in the rearview, and knew he probably shouldn't have even been trying to look, but there he was, staring at Steve, asleep, slumped against Robin shoulder. Robin went back to reading - lord knows how she could read so much without getting carsick - and absentmindedly combing her fingers through Steve’s hair.

Billy clenched his jaw a little, turning away. In physical pain and also insanely jealous. Robin was a fucking lesbian, and Billy wasn’t even supposed to be thinking this way about Steve anymore. You can kill a feeling like that if you really try, he’d done it before. So was he just not trying?

Robin fell asleep.

Max was looking a little rough around the edges, too.

“You ok?” He asked her.

“You don’t have to keep asking me that.”

“You look tired.”

“Yeah, well. Hard time sleeping.”

“I literally watch you sleep.”

“Hard time dreaming then.” She said more quietly. “Stop interrogating me.”

Billy did.

“Why can’t you drive?” Max asked him after a minute. 

Billy shrugged. “Can’t.”

“Right but like-”

“Oh so you can interrogate me, but I cant interrogate you?’

“Don’t answer me then-”

“I get… worried.”   
“About?”

“...Not being in control.”

Max nodded. “Makes sense.”

Billy didn’t say anything.

“You could try. I think you’d be fine.”

“It’s not that easy.”

Max’s turn to be quiet.

“I’ll try.” Billy said after a second. Max smiled at him, short and quick, before returning her focus to driving.

Steve woke up about two hours out from Nevada and said he was terribly upset he wasn't woken up sooner. Nobody cared.

Then he pulled over not ten minutes into driving again and called a team meeting. 

“Never say ‘team meeting’ to me ever again.” Billy cut him off mid thought.

“Group discussion-”

“No.”   
“People in car talking to each other.”

Billy shrugged. “Sure.”

“Ok. Here’s the jist-”

Steve stated the obvious: the car was a mess. Full of amassed candy wrappers and water bottles and covered in mud and dust and dead bugs. It kinda smelled weird too.

“So, gang, we have,” Steve tried to do the math and failed. Robin did it for him. “Five spare dollars for the day and I vote we get a car wash. Exciting!”

“So exciting.” Max laid the sarcasm on thick. 

But a car wash was totally necessary. 

They found a self serve one in St. George and Steve spent an age pushing quarters into the machine and meticulously scrubbing the car with soap, talking mostly to Max while Robin and Billy took the time off. 

Steve was telling Max about how keeping your car clean meant paint longevity and professionalism when you arrived places, when the water switched on and he started hosing down the car and she grabbed his arm. 

“Woah, wait. I want the water gun.”

Steve looked at her, then at the hose in his hand. “You want… ok. Sure.”

He handed it to her. 

Max started gleefully pressure washing the back of the car, with perhaps a bit too much zeal, because just as Robin and Billy were returning from a snack break around the corner she ended up spraying them. Not bad, just enough.

“Hey watch it, dipshit!” Billy called over the car, shaking off his semi drenched hand. 

“Watch where you're walking!” She called back, grinning.

Steve snorted a little. 

“You two think this is funny?” He handed Robin his soda, walking over. 

“Kinda funny.”

Max anticipated Billy’s grab for the hose, so pulled back in time, laughing as she ran around the other side. 

“You’re wasting water!” Steve called but no one paid any attention because by that point Billy had managed to catch up with her, wrestling the hose out of Max’s hands to spray her with. She shrieked and ducked behind Robin who gasped at the onset of cold water. 

“Nothing personal, Buckley.” Billy laughed at Robin’s outraged smile. 

“Right, I’m just collateral damage.” she tried to grab it out of his hands. In a three way lunge for the hose which no one won, Steve lost. 

Steve, standing idly by, got absolutely drenched in what might have been an on-purpose accident. And of course he had to get revenge. 

They spent the last five minutes of the wash timer in total water warfare, all of them soaked through in foul tasting and freezing water by the end of it. It was nice though, the air was so warm in Utah.

They found a public bathroom to split off into to change and attempt to dry off, otherwise the drive would be miserable, but everyone was in a pretty good mood, even Billy.

He was easier to talk to.

Because after a minute it was just the two of them, holed up in a men's bathroom in the middle of nowhere and they could still talk easy. Almost like nothing was wrong.

Almost like before-before. Like in spring, before anything. 

Steve was done changing first, wringing his shirt out over the sink, making conversation when Billy reappeared- he’d used a stall to change, and Steve hadn't said anything, he figured it was because of the scars. He’d seen Billy naked a hundred times in the locker rooms anyway. 

He laughed a little to himself. They had to start being real careful sneaking around at the end of the school year, not to do or think anything stupid around each other in the locker rooms. Easy to give it away. 

Billy walked over and cracked his knuckles absently against the sink counter. The chain of his pendant left a thin line of wet around the neck of his shirt from the droplets that had stuck to it. He could do with a shave. 

It was totally impossible for Steve not to think about him.

Billy could feel Steve staring at him, probably thinking he was being weird, or something. He wished he wouldn’t, because it made Billy feel like a piece of shit asshole all over again for not apologising already, not owning his shit already. 

Steve was talking about Live Aid for the fourth time in two days, and really, Billy should find a rerun of it it was  _ sooo _ good.

So maybe Billy should just talk to him. 

“You think I’d like it?”

“Dude, Judas Priest played! You love Judas Priest.”   
Billy smiled. “Right and I’m guessing you liked it because Madonna played.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Steve laughed. “She’s good!”

“You’re just in love with her-”

“Shut up!”

“Remember you told me some kid caught you lip syncing  _ Holiday _ at work?”

“You are such an asshole!-”   
“And you were  _ so _ embarrassed-”

“Stop, seriously,” Steve said, still smiling. 

“You know I regret not going to the mall for ice cream ever.” Billy said evenly. 

Steve didn’t respond right away. 

“I regret not going to the pool.”

Billy thought about playing it safe. He’d never really been that kind of person. 

“Nah, you in swim trunks? Wouldn’t have been able to do my job right.” 

Steve briefly stopped being able to function but played it off like measured silence. It didn’t work.

“Cat got your tongue, Harrington?” Billy smirked a little. 

“No,” Steve managed. “Just, that was smooth.”

Billy wasn't looking at him, but he wants not looking at him, either. 

“I remember you used to always smell like chlorine…” Steve said more quietly.

“You always smelled like cheap-ass vanilla.”

Steve laughed a little. 

They should probably leave. They were dressed and dry and Robin and Max were probably waiting outside and the moment should be over…

But neither wanted it to end. 

“Should we-” Billy barely tired.

“Wait,” Steve said, stepping in front of him a little. “Let me just…”

Steve pulled the collar of Billy’s shirt between two fingers, shifting it straight and smooth. He let his hand stay there for too long, what they both knew to be too long a time for the space they were keeping, the thing they had ended that was over and done with and… and stupid.

It was stupid to stay away. 

For the first time in ages, could Billy maybe just, you know feel things? Was that so fucking wrong?

And for the first time in ages he could taste Steve’s breath in the centimeters of space between them. It tasted just the same as it did before, as it probably always had, sweet spit sour, like the warmth of burnt sugar, filthy and familiar and far away and so achingly close. Closer, now, Steve had sunk forward on his feet a little, tilted his head a little -  _ kiss me kiss me kiss me  _ \- and just in the way Billy had been half remembering the horrible things that tormented him from July, he remembered the last time they had kissed, fierce and crazed, in Steve’s room at three am. His parents had been home, he’d said that, but Billy snuck in anyway with a breathless: “I needed to see you.”

_ I need you, I want you, I worship you _ , and Billy could still feel Steve’s fingernails digging into the then-unmarked skin of his chest and his back,  _ I can’t stop thinking about you,  _ he could still hear Steve’s voice in the dark,  _ I love you,  _ he could still feel the gasp that seemed to take over his whole body when Steve had grabbed the waistband of his jeans to unbuckle, unbutton, unzip, get Billy undone in his hands. 

And still, here they were, alone in a bathroom, Steve’s hands unmoving from Billy’s collar, Billy unmoving from where he stood, leaning back against the sink. 

_ I need you. _

Just staring at each other.

_ I miss you. _

Billy made the decision, took the leap of faith and he grabbed Steve’s cheek with a hand to pull him in-

_ I- _

just as Robin called them from outside and they both pulled away from each other, startled.

Steve looked from the door, to Billy, unsure, before walking back outside. 

“Sorry,” was all he said.

And they were so fucking far away. 

Billy almost wanted to scream. 

Was that a mistake? Spur of the moment bullshit? He’d been so sure, and wasn’t he trying to be normal? Or was it just ok that he was trying to  _ be _ . And why couldn't he be both? Normal and ok? Why couldn’t he just collapse into Steve’s arms and cry or, alternatively, rip his clothes off and fuck his brains out?

Not that he’d ever even done that with a guy, let alone Steve, let alone now. 

Because it was different now. 

How do you tell someone whose heart you broke you’d love nothing more than to press your lips to theirs? 

How do you even begin to articulate the crushing weight of being so very aware that every second that passes is one less second together, and still you haven't said anything?

You haven't unbroken their heart.

You haven't even tried.

  
  



	7. Viva Las Vegas, Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey! TW being outed. Someone (guess who) get's forcibly outed in this chapter so take care of yourselves! I promise it all turns out ok.  
I love you.  
\--  
Ohhh my god I wrote all of the notes down las night so I could jut hit post this morning I got NO sleep and have a midterm in an hour wish me luck boyos

No one noticed they were in Arizona until Robin said “oh, we’re in Arizona.”

The car had gotten oddly quiet in the last coupe of hours. 

Robin liked to think it was the change in scenery, dusty flat and lovely desert, and not whatever angst bullshit was stewing between the boys in the front seat. Steve had looked kind of flustered in a bad way when he’d gotten back in the car from drying off. Billy had been dead silent since. 

Max opted to talk only to Robin, clearly familiar with this kind of stand offishness. 

They even started talking about D&D without Billy cutting in to make fun. 

It was weird. 

And was Steve ok? He looked... Well, he looked kind of wrecked. 

Should she talk to him?

But they were never alone. 

Steve wanted to cry a little bit. He didn’t, and he wouldn’t, but he wanted to. Why had Billy done that? What was his plan, making out like he was going to kiss Steve? He wouldn’t just fuck with him for the hell of it, right? And why had Steve been the one to say sorry? He wasn't the one flirting and cold-shouldering at intervals, he was just there. Why did he even drive them all the way out here-

Billy was so fucking stupid. What was even his plan, seriously? Going in for a kiss and then what? It wasn't like he could just get back with Steve and pretend nothing was wrong, he’d really severely chewed him out before. 

And why had he even tired to go for it anyway? It was so fucking-

“Hey, is that Vegas?” Max leaned forward. 

They had just dipped into Nevada. 

The sun was starting to set over the desert landscape, pink and purple-y, and there was this dull and captivating orange glow on the horizon. 

And in an hour, it was. 

“Holy shit, we’re in Las Vegas!” Robin watched the world light up around her.

“Fuck yeah we are.” Billy took the toothpick out from between his teeth, smiling a little. 

“It’s kinda beautiful,” Steve said, leaning out the window a little.

It really was. It smelled like hot air and plastic and gas and cigarettes and piss and looked like the stars had fallen from the sky and scarred themselves across the Nevada desert. If he didn’t know Billy to be a Californian though and through, he could see him in a place like this. Gritty and phoney and absolutely glorious. 

“Quick question, how the fuck are we supposed to afford a hotel here?”

“We’re not. We have to drive through.”

“Drive through Las Vegas and _ not _ get out of the car?”  
“Can we at least stop for food?”

They at least stopped at a gas station, prime time for everyone to make their case against Robin to stay the night in Vegas.

“Why am _ I _ the bad guy?”

“You’re not the bad guy Buckley, you've just got the most brains out of anyone in the car.”

“Robin, please-?”  
“Oh my god! Bottom line is we have only enough money, _ collectively _ , to get to San Diego and just barely enough for Steve and I to make it back to Hawkins on time. So unless someone here won the lottery in the past three days-”  
“Wait.” Steve sat up. “Mom’s credit card.” 

“What?”

“My mom gave me her credit card for the trip! When I said I was taking Robin for a college tour she gave me her card and technically she said for emergencies but I can use it for dinner at least.”

"_And_ a hotel?"

"Well-"

“Steve that’s going to be so much money-”

“Yeah, but she wont know.”

“Mommy and daddy’s credit card? Really Steve?” Billy jabbed. 

“Look, you want a magical night in Vegas, or not?” Steve was immediately defensive. 

Robin listened to them argue for a bit. Why was this the first iteration they’d had in hours? Everything seemed like it was getting better that morning. What changed?

“Do they ever just, get along?” She mumbled.

“Not for more than three seconds.” Max snorted. 

But they decided on getting at least dinner. 

A nice dinner, too, some middle ground Italian place, and Robin was sure they all smelled like car wash still but it was fun. Steve and Billy stopped arguing, and conversation was even and relaxed. 

“This is so nice.” Max started her fourth breastick. “I think I forgot what not eating in a moving car was like.”

“Me too, man.” Steve had his arm up for a soda refill. 

Wen was the last time any of them had been out to dinner?  
Steve took Robin on a fake date at Burger King (yes that was the time she cried in the parking lot) and they ate inside if that counted.

It did not. 

Then Steve’s birthday maybe.

Billy never went out to eat. 

“Why not have this be your birthday dinner?”

“What?” Billy looked up from his menu, stopped drumming his fingers on the table. 

“It’s not like you had a party or anything-”  
“How would this be my birthday dinner. It was weeks ago and I hate my birthday-”

“Do it for the cake.” Max cut him off. “If one of us tells the staff its your birthday we get free cake. I want free cake.”

“Oh yeah,” Robin started.

“No, no I’m convinced.” Billy smiled a little.

“Oh we should do a toast.”

Max started chanting ‘speech.’

“Ok, ok,” Billy waved his hand for her to stop. He cleared his throat for the show of it. “If I was going to be anywhere on, you know, my very real birthday, I’m glad it’s Vegas. Shame it had to be with you guys, though.”

They cheers’d. 

Billy left to use the bathroom and Max dragged a waiter over and when he got back they were presented with free cake. Hallelujah. 

It was good too, a fat slice of one of those overly chocolate ones that made your tongue go buttery. 

Billy laughed when they started singing, and in the candlelight, Robin could see Steve smiling at him. 

But not the smile of earlier that day, this was a sad, wistful smile. 

Robin could guess what he was thinking about. 

Steve gave Max a piggyback ride on the way back to the car. 

She had initially asked Billy for one, but he said he was pretty good on the broken ribs front, he’d already had three of those. 

“How are you even alive?”

“You tell me.”  
And with not a lot of convincing, Steve caved. They could get a hotel. A real hotel. 

And Mr. and Mrs. Harrington were paying for it. 

They walked around for a while from where they’d parked, exploring the glowing streets packed with people and sound. Shows were happening at nearly ever building, casinos ablaze with neon and music and shine. 

Max opted to walk again to check out a motorcycle being advertized as winnable, standing on the outside edge of a wall to peek into the casino ground floor as Robin held her up. 

“I’m sorry your birthday card was so shitty,” Steve said to Billy, the two of them leaned up against a grimey, overpainted wall.

“Dude, don’t even-” Billy tried to stop him. 

“No seriously, I know you hate your birthday I shoulda done something.”

“What, like I did on your birthday?”

Steve smiled to himself. 

On his birthday, way back in the start of May, Billy had taken him to the supermarket to buy an entire sheet cake and eat it in the parking lot. They didn't light candles or anything. They just ate cake and talked in Billy’s Camaro for like two hours. Steve didn’t stop grinning the entire time. He had confided in Billy his birthday was usually a good time, his parents would take him to a steakhouse and give him a new watch or something and his old friends would toast him at whatever rager happened that weekend, but this year, the year he turned 18, no one was around. Both his parents were out of town, promising to celebrate when they got back, and he didn’t really have any friends come the end of senior year. The kids tried to make a thing of it. They lit candles and sang and gave him a comic book he pretended to like but it wasn't the same. 

Billy made it special. 

That was the first time they'd gone farther than just kissing. 

But now wasnt the time to think about that. 

Now was the time to check into the cheapest luxury hotel money could buy. It had an indoor fountain and a bellhop to take them to their rooms on the top floor, just down the hall from each other, and mints on all the pillows. 

Continental breakfast would be from 7-9 the following day, and they were welcome to use the pool at any hour. 

They all ditched their stuff to use the pool. It had a fucking waterfall. 

The radio played exclusively cheesy 70s hits (Steve pointed out when Hotel California came on) and they all broke back into the bottle of vodka from Colorado. 

How far away Colorado seemed. 

And how close was California. 

They all played at being classy hotel guests, in mismatched bathing suits and small-town tastes. 

And maybe Steve could just ignore the weird moment in the bathroom, Billy was being nice to him again. 

It just…. Nagged at him. 

It wasn't all that nice of Billy, was it?

  
Billy was being an asshole and he knew it. 

You couldn't just pretend like everything is fine after that, he was being an asshole!  
And what did he want anyway? The question he’d been asking himself for the past hours, days, weeks. Steve asked him that.

_ What do you want? _

He kept thinking about it as the rest of them dried off (Billy hadn’t gone in the pool this time, opting to not have to take off anymore layers than he absolutely had to, not wanting any weird looks or questions about the scars) and Max was flipping through the TV guide on their room’s bed, looking for a crowd pleaser. They were supposed to stay up for a movie night, per Max’s request. Billy bailed to take a shower not long after. He thought better in water anyway. 

So what do you want?

Don’t think about the bullshit. Don’t think about what you should want, how you should feel, how you exect to feel, what you’re afraid of feeling. 

What do you want?

Billy sighed, feeling hot water on his skin.

Steve. He wanted Steve back. He could admit that. Regardless if that was a bad idea or selfish or stupid or wrong. 

He just wanted Steve back. 

Steve might not want that, though.

So what would Billy do?

He could apologize.

When Billy got out of the shower, Max was already gone to the other room. When he got out into the hall, Steve was just walking up from the car, just two doors down. 

That was sooner that Billy would have liked. 

But no time would be the right time. 

“Steve,” Billy called.

Steve turned, surprised. “Hey.” He stopped. 

“Do you have a minute?” Billy stepped closer, leaning against the wall.

“Uh, yeah. What’s-”

They both glanced to the door as the phone within started ringing. 

“That’s Dustin,” Steve said almost reflexively. “I- I have to, take that.”

“Yeah,” Billy said quickly. “Sure.”

Steve nodded at him, before disappearing inside. 

Billy leaned his head against the gaudy hotel hallway wall. He sighed. This was fine. He could just wait. Just wait for Steve to get off the phone and talk to him then.

Say sorry. 

Say what he wanted.

Tell the truth. 

Steve had been calling Dustin everyday when they got to a phone for the night. It was a request by the party at large that Steve regularly check in to confirm that he and Max and Robin were still alive and well. Oh and also Billy. 

This had proven to be kinda fun, as Steve had started recounting, in brief, things he saw on the trip that Dustin might find interesting. When he’d called Dustin just twenty minutes before now, he hadn't picked up, so he’d just left a lengthy voicemail about a cool cactus they had seen and ran back out to the car to get ones for the vending machine.

He kinda wished Dustin had picked a different time to call back, because what had Billy wanted to talk to him about?

This was good too though, probably. 

“Hello?”

“Steve, its Dustin.”

“Hey man! Did you get my voicemail?-”

“There’s been- it’s just- it’s a _ total _ disaster.”

Steve looked pointedly at Robin, readjusting his grip on the phone, thinking of Russians and monsters. “A disaster?”

“Steve,” Dustin hesitated. “People _ know _.”

_ People know about you. _

_ About Billy. _

_ About what you did. _

Oh.

That was… worse.

Funny, Steve had thought about this happening. About someone catching them, or overhearing something, or anything that meant someone else knew. And what he could say to deny it, to laugh and call it crazy, to get mad and brush it off, to ignore it altogether. What he could do to stop it, bribe, lie, anything. Whatever he could do to make it not the truth. Whatever he could do to stay safe, stay out of it, or to keep Billy out of it, take the blame. What he could say to his parents. What they might say to him.

But he’d never guessed how he’d actually feel. 

Because whatever people ‘knew’, whatever they were saying? It was probably true. 

That crushed him. Absolutely crushed. He felt like he’d been winded by the reality of it. No matter what, he couldn’t deny any part of it. It’d be like lying about the color of his eyes, or his shoe size. So obviously untrue, and easy to immediately disprove. Why even try? 

He sat on the floor, leaning back against the side of the bed, listening to Dustin babble.

Someone started a rumor, which would have been fine but it caught on. No proof, but enough lack of it to run with the idea. 

Billy, angry, weird outcast, Californian, his hair, or his jeans or something, something that meant proof. All the proof they had on Steve was that he was Billy’s friend. Steve laughed a little. When had he and Billy ever been friends?

“Steve, are you ok?” Robin crouched next to him, and hand on his shoulder. He smiled, he shook his head, he couldn’t look at her. 

He tried so hard not to cry. Not from anything that made sense either, just… panic.

“Steve? Steve.” Dustin's voice cracked a little through the receiver. “Say something.”

“Did you tell?” Steve heard himself ask. 

“What? Jesus, Steve, no. Of fucking course not. Why would-”

“Who else knows.”

“I dunno, a lot of people-

“Dustin, who _ knows _?!” Steve raised his voice without meaning to.

Dustin stuttered a little, surprised. 

Someone at the high school had started it. Lucas overheard it. 

Lucas, so the party. Will, El, Mike. 

Will, so Jonathan. 

Jonathan and Mike, so Nancy. 

So Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler.

So every other fucking household in town. 

So Steve’s parents.

Everyone, maybe. 

And what were they saying?

Vague and vulgar things about what two perverted young men might spend their time doing.

Steve noticed belatedly that he was sort of nauseous. 

“Steve, what’s happening?” Robin tried again. He just handed her the phone. He heard her tone change. He stared at one spot on the carpet and nowhere else. 

“Hey- hey Dustin, it’s Robin. What’s- oh fuck. Well who started it?...”

Steve pulled it together enough to speak. 

“I still have to call my mom.” He told Robin. “She wanted us to check in.”

Robin put her hand over the receiver. “Steve, if she’s heard this shit-”

“I have to talk to her if we want her to think everything’s fine.”

Robin chewed her cheek, brow furrowed. Steve wished she wouldnt look at him like that, but it wasn’t pity. It was complete and total understanding, which was somehow worse. This was the worst fear. 

“It’s just a rumor.”

But they couldn't have the phone right away, because El wanted to talk to Max so Robin had to go get Max who took the news stone-faced and dragged the phone as far as the cord would go to lock herself in the bathroom to talk to El, and then Lucas, and then the whole party on the line for a while before Robin demanded the phone back. This was high school drama bullshit and they should all be shutting up and being normal.

“Do you want me to lie?” Max’s question hung in the air from where she stood in the bathroom doorway. 

“Not to them.” Steve pulled a hand through his hair. 

“Are you-”

Steve stood up. He walked to Max, to the phone just over the threshold of the bathroom. 

He took it from her hands and put it on speaker. 

“-like some big fucking secret-” Mike was saying.

“Hey, guys,” Steve said. He might have been on auto pilot, but he had to do this. He couldn’t lie to the kids. “Everyone here?”

“Steve, what are you-” Dustin warned. 

“I got this, Dustin.” Steve cleared his throat. “So. You guys have heard a lot of shit about me in the past few hours. That’s fine. I just wanted to say that, um…” Steve looked up. Robin was hugging his arm, squeezing his hand. And that was better. 

“I’m not gonna lie to you.” Steve said, looking down at the phone, then up, surprised to see his own reflection looking back at him. The bathroom mirror was right there. 

He looked… fine. 

“Whatever people are saying, it’s probably true. Max and Dustin can probably answer-”

“They _ knew _?” Mike practically yelled. 

“Oh my god he really does have favorites.” Lucas said almost to himself. 

“Hey, woah, I do not have favorites-”

“I knew.” El said plainly.

Everyone started talking over each other. 

“Guys, guys wait this is serious-”

Questions started. 

And the overwhelming question was:

“Why him? Why Billy? He’s an asshole- no offense Max.”

“No, none taken.”

And why would Dustin and Max lie? Well they weren't lying, they were just stretching the truth up until now. 

They promised not to lie to each other. 

“I know, I’m sorry-”

“Don’t apologize, Steve.”

“I know I’m not in the, you know, ‘party’, or-”

“Not in the party? Steve, you’re like our Gandalf-” Dustin started.

“No you dumbass, he’s not Gandlaf, he’s Strider” Lucas cut in.

Steve almost laughed. 

“Why didn’t you tell us before?” That was definitely Will.

Steve hesitated. 

“Do you have any idea how hard that would be, dipshit?” Dustin immediately defined.

“Ok, calm down Dustin.”

“Sorry.”

“Wait, lemme-” Mike started.

“Mike if you-” Max cut him off.

“I’m not! I’m not! Jesus.”

“I still like you, Steve.” El said evenly. “I don’t think you’re bad.”

“Thanks, El.”

That pretty much convinced everyone else. They were still surprised, said they had questions for when Steve got back but Max told them to leave him alone and he told her to chill out.

Then the party said they missed Max. 

Then everyone promised to defend his honor with their lives, him and House Mayfield/Hargrove. 

So that went better than expected. 

Then Steve got the phone back. He put it back on the table next to the bed.

He dialed his house’s landline, and prayed his mom picked up.

“Harrington residence.”

“Hey, mom.”

“Steve! Sweetheart, how’s the trip?”

“It’s good.”

“Excited to see the west coast?”

“Yeah, Robin was just-”

“So glad to hear it. Steve honey, has anyone told you about the rumors yet?”

“Uh, yeah Dustin actually-”  
“It’s so horrible what they’re saying. Of course your father and I don’t buy a minute of it, kids can be so cruel.”

“Yeah they-”

“I mean, I knew you lost popularity, but this? This is uncalled for.”

“I was just-”

“Oh and how’s Robin taking it? Is she alright?”

Steve closed his eyes, listening to himself breathe for a moment. “Wanna talk to her?”

He handed Robin the phone. She took it, looking at him in a way that made him look away. 

“Hey Mrs. Harrington. Yeah, we’re good. Yeah, I heard. No, um… it doesn’t bother me. We’re fine. Yeah he’s fine. Well I wouldn't exactly say that but- yeah. Yeah. You too. Bye.” She put the phone down. “Your mom says bye.”

“Yeah,” was all Steve could think of to say.

“No one believes it.”

“Doesn't matter.”

It didn’t matter. Because even if people didn’t think it was true, they’d always be looking for it. Guilty until proven innocent. And what could Steve prove?

It didn’t matter because it was true. He’d have to actively lie, actively hide, and hear and see himself lie and hide. 

Steve didn’t like lying.

Max told Billy as he was getting back from walking around the hotel, getting his wallet from back in their room.

But he didn’t seem to care. 

“I’m never going back to that shithole.”

And Max wondered if he was hiding his emotions or really didn’t give a shit, but he left the room, taking a trip to the vending machine, and Max was left to return to the other room. She sort of wished she hadn't. 

Steve hoped that was the last of it. That was the last of the stress and explaining and lying he’d have to do. That could be it. But the phone rang again, and at first Steve thought it would be Dustin again, or his mom forgot something, but it wasn't. 

“Hello?”

“Hi Steve.”

_ Nancy. _

“Nance.” Steve blinked a few times. “Hi.”

Robin tensed, looking at Steve.

“I’m sure you’ve heard, but um,” Nancy kept going. “There’s been a few rumors since you left about Billy Hargrove,”

Steve tensed.

“And about you. Like, the both of you.”

“I heard.”

“Well it’s just… it’s concerning.”

“I’m not concerned.”

“Well maybe you should be.”

“Why?”

“_ Steve _,” Nancy’s voice seared through the receiver. “I just need you to tell me it’s not true.”

“_ What _ ?”  
“Everything people are saying about Billy and- and about you! I mean, he’s a little, you know, but-”

“What does _ that _ mean?” Steve cut her off.

“What does what mean?”

“You said ‘he’s a little you know’. What does that mean?”

“I just mean he’s weird, Steve. He’s all, aggressive, and erratic.” Nancy picked out her biggest best words.

“That’s bullshit.”

“What?”

“That’s bullshit. You can’t just say shit about people, Nancy.”

“You're defending him?”

“Yeah. I am.”

“Dear _ god _ Steve, do you mean to tell me-”

“I don’t mean to tell you anything, Nancy. You called me. I didn’t call you. I don’t have anything to say to you. And I don’t have to.”

“I think I deserve a little bit of an explanation, I mean, you said you _ loved _ me was that even true-”

“Shut up. Shut the hell up. I don’t owe you shit, Nancy Wheeler. So what if it’s all true? That’s none of your fucking buisness. You don’t get to drag another confession of undying love out of me, because we’re not dating. We’re not even friends. I was so nice to you for so long. Like you fucking jump from me to Jonathan and I just play it cool, because I want you to be happy. And clearly you don’t want the same for me. Sure, maybe I was a dick but you have been _ horrible _ to me so why don’t we just call it even? Yeah?”

“You can’t just let-”

“Fucking tell on me, Nancy. Run to the press. Rat me out as a big fucking homo I don’t care.”

“I wouldn’t do that-”

“Great! Then leave me alone.” 

Nancy might have tried to respond but Steve slammed down the receiver. 

He was breathing a little harder in the kind of shaky way that only came with anger. Because he was really fucking angry. Then confused. Then hurt. Then filled with dread. Totally disoriented. 

“Holy shit.” Max breathed.

Steve looked up at her. “What?”

“You just tore Nancy Wheeler a new one _ over the phone _.”

“Oh,” Steve looked back at the inert telephone.

Steve felt like breaking something a little. Or crying. But he didn’t ever do either of those things.

Robin touched his shoulder “Steve, are you-?”

“I gotta go.” He said suddenly, pulling away

“Are you sure-”

“I just- I gotta go outside for a bit. Or, walk- just walk around.” Steve was saying as he opened the door. 

Billy was there, looking up from where he’d been reaching for the doorknob, an unopened can of Coca-Cola in his hand. 

_ Of course it’s you. _

“You good, Harrington?” Billy tried but Steve pushed past him and into the hall. He just had to get away.

Billy watched Steve walk away for a second. He could feel the anger rolling off him, he’d felt that way many times. This was particularly coiled, particularly bad. 

Billy turned back to the hotel room, back to Robin.

“What happened?”

“Other than the whole shebang? Nancy called.”

“Shit,” Billy muttered.

“What should-”

“Stay here with Max,” Billy told her. “I’ll talk to him.”

“I’m not sure he wants to be talked to.”

Billy hesitated. He looked at Robin again. She was basically an expert on Steve, and as jealous as he got, she was a really good friend. 

“Maybe not.”

Billy could just apologize, then. He was pretty stubborn when he wanted to be. 

_ Keep your distance. _

Billy found Steve easily enough, he could hear the radio through his hotel room door. 

_ Keep your distance. _

Oh, fuck that. Fuck keeping your distance. This wasn't about Billy right now, this was about Steve. Nothing was ever about Steve, this had to be. 

_ Keep your distance! _

He knocked. 

“Harrington, you in there?”  
No response.

“I look real stupid standing out here in the hall talking to a door.”

Nothing.

“‘Course that’s probably what you want.”

Not a sound

“C’mon, you can have my coke.”

The radio switched off. Footsteps. The door opened. 

“What do you want?” was what Steve said, unusually harsh.

Billy shrugged it off. “More painkillers, I guess. A million dollars, a new car-”

“Stop.”

“I wanna talk to you.”

“Why?”

“Because you should talk to someone.”

“I’ll talk to Robin.”

“I want you to talk to me.”

Steve didn’t say anything. 

“Let me in,” Billy nudged past Steve into the hotel room.

Steve didn’t move from the door besides to close it behind Billy. Billy sat down on the end of the bedspread and cracked his coke. 

“I thought you said I could have it.” Steve turned around.

“Well, I lied.” 

“Right, of course.” Billy could hear Steve actively steadying his voice. 

“What’s that mean?” Billy said, knowing what would happen, knowing he’d gotten to a tipping point.

“What des that mean?” Steve finally snapped. “It means you’re a fucking liar. I know you lied to me about wanting to break up. I fucking knew it. You could have just told me, you know. You could have just explained what happened with your dad, if that was it. Or if you needed time to be alone, or whatever! You didn’t have to rake me over the coals and break it off all of a sudden. Not like it’s even the fist time that’s happened to me! And you never said anything! I thought you hated me! It fucking killed me not seeing you. I thought you died hating my guts. You know how that feels?”

Billy sipped his coke. “How?”

“Really fucking shitty, that’s how. And, and earlier, at the car wash, I mean- what was that about? I really stuck my neck out for you. I drove you here from Indi-fucking-ana.”

“I didn’t ask you to.”

“Fuck that! You think I would have just let you fend for yourself?”

“No. But you could have. So what’s your point?”

“My point is I want a fucking apology!”

Billy nodded. “Ok.” He set his coke down on the besdie table and stood up. They were fairly close to the same height.

“I’m sorry.” Billy said, even and sincere.

“Fuck you.”

“That’s fair.”

“You’re not gonna tell me I don’t mean it?”

“I’m not gonna tell you how to feel.”

“How are you so calm?”  
“I've been yelled at a lot.” Billy shrugged. 

Steve laughed humorlessly.

“I shouldn’t have said that shit to you.” Billy said.

Steve met his gaze.

“You didn’t deserve it. I’m sorry.” Billy repeated

“Yeah, well. Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“You’re an asshole.”

“Yep.”

Steve flopped down onto the bed, pulling a hand through his hair, staring at the ceiling. Billy sat back down next to him. 

“What did the charming Miss Wheeler have to say?”

“Just that she deserves an explanation.”

“From you?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“That’s what I said.”

Billy thought for a bit. “You know, no one’s gonna say anything when you get back to Hawkins with Robin. Everyone thinks you guys are dating anyway. Probably gonna let it go.”

“They’re still gonna say stuff about you.” Steve sighed. 

“I don’t give a shit. I’m never going back.”

“I hate this.” Steve sat back up.

“The rumors?”

“No,” Steve let his hands fall into his hands. “Well, yeah. But mostly I hate _ this _.”

Billy knew what he meant. Not a single fucking day had gone by that he didn’t wish for there to be less space between him and Steve. In every sense. He wanted to apologize, to explain, and just didn know how. Or he was just being a total pussy. 

And honestly, that was then. This is now. Hawkins was two thousand miles away. And he wasn't dead. Point Billy. 

Why not just say what he was thinking?

“I didn’t want to break up with you.” 

“What?” Steve looked up.

“I didn’t want to break up with you. My dad thought he figured something out, so I was trying to play it safe. But I fucked up. I was headed out the way of the steel mill because-" Billy almost laughed to himself. How fucking _stupid_. "Because I was meeting up with Mrs. Wheeler to try to, I dunno, get over it. I just... it’s all my fault.”

“Karen Wheeler?”

“Yeah.” 

“You tried to sleep with _Nancy’s_ _mom_?”

“Why is-?”  
“Dude, she’s like, forty!”  
“And?”  
“That’s illegal!”

“Why is ‘that’s illegal’ what you’re getting out of this conversation?”  
“It’s like, bad! And why her? Why not sleep with someone our age? Sleep with Nancy for christ’s sake.”

“Like you would ever forgive me if I did that.”

“I wouldn’t be mad because shes’ my ex, I just would expect better from you.” Steve smiled a little.

“Whoa-ho-ho. Bitter much?”  
“Listen, I can be as bitter as I want. She’s been horrible to me.”  
“Like how?”  
“Like she asked if I ever even loved her.”

“Fuck her, jesus.”

“Yeah.”

“If I didn’t hate her before.”

“You hate everyone.”

“Not you. Well, a little you.”

“What?”

“You said you hate me, we’re fucking even.”

Steve laughed a little. 

They sat in silence.

“Feel any better?” Billy asked eventually.

“Yeah.”  
“Good.”

Billy handed Steve the second half of his coke. 

Steve took it. 

Billy watched Steve tap the edges of the can, read the back of it, fidget. Like neither of them knew what to say, because Billy had tried, just now, really tried to make it all better. Too little, too late probably. He should probably leave. Just leave them even at both having apologised, both not being shitty, both just people who could let history be history. Steve was probably tore up about the gossip back home, anyway. 

Billy should leave.

“I’m gonna go.”

Steve looked up from the coke in his hands. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow-”

Steve kissed him. Billy hadn't been kissed by anyone in ages, let alone Steve, let alone someone he loved the way he still loved Steve, the way he never stopped loving Steve. So he didn’t pull back because he didn’t want to be kissing Steve, he pulled back because for a couple seconds he was completely overwhelmed. He pulled back and just stared at Steve, practically wide-eyed.

“Don’t go.” Steve said plainly. Halfway between a request and a command. A mix of desperate and lovely.

_ Don’t get up, don’t leave the room. Please. _

He still held Billy’s head in his hands. 

_ I won’t. _

Billy kissed him back, initiated it. And god, what a relief. To have memories of this, of them, flooding back, to feel his skin getting warmer, to feel his mouth hot, to breathe Steve’s smell, to touch him again after so long. There was muscle memory to it, too, like tilting his head the other way, like leaning his chin forward like Steve liked, like the way he always dug his his thumbs into Steve’s hipbones just under his t-shirt, just above his jeans waistband. It was a-whole-nother level of kissing to know just how someone liked it done, just how Steve liked to be kissed, and touched, and pushed and pulled and threaded through and intertwined and felt. 

Billy forgot how good it was to kiss someone who knew how to kiss you. 

Steve sat up, kicked off his shoes, moved a leg to sit with a knee on either side of Billy’s hips, effectively straddling his lap. Still lip-locked, lacing his hands’ behind Billy’s neck.

Billy stopped thinking. 

Thinking was terrible. So far in the past months it had only brought him trouble. He was finished with it. 

He could just feel. 

The kind of charge that built from having to not touch for so long was overwhelming, it had him digging his fingernails into the fabric of Steve’s sweatpants he always wore as pyjamas, breathless between kisses, feeling spit collecting in the back of his throat. 

Overwhelmed.

Just because it was Steve, again, so familiar, and not far away. Not far away at all, but right here, and right now. Steve with gentle, broad hands and sure, trusting, relentless kisses. At one point Steve pulled back, but not to speak, not to stop, just to smile at Billy, run gentle, easy fingertips across his cheekbones, brow, jaw, before kissing him again. 

Billy laughed. Out of nowhere, the kind that sort of press out. 

He was happy.

Happy to not be thinking.

Happy to just be feeling. 

For all the fucked up shit that had happened that evening, this made it worth it, to get the apology Steve had been waiting for and get back to this. Fuck, man. He missed this. How could he forget what a fantastic kisser Billy was? How could he bear to forget anything about him at all, if only to remember it all now. And to be happy together again. 

Desire was overwhelming in the aftermath of despondency. 

Billy pulled them both down onto the bed-

“I missed you.”

“I missed you too.”

-grabbing at Steve’s legs-

“I don’t like not being with you.”

“Fucking hate it.”

-Kisses across Billy’s neck-

“I thought you hated me.”

“I could never hate you.”

-Billy’s thumbs pressing into Steve’s inner thighs-

“Forgive me?” Billy gasped out. 

Steve stopped for a moment. He held a hand to Billy’s jaw.

“I forgive you.” He smiled. “Just don’t pull that shit again.”

“No promises.”

Billy kissed him, bit his lower lip a little. 

Just as Billy was shifting his hands up Steve’s shirt, Steve pulled away again.

_ Now or never, right? _

“Let’s have sex.”

“What?” Billy was caught completely off guard, he even pulled his hands back a little.

“I mean, we don’t have to. I just- well I might never see you again after this week. And I missed you. Jesus, I missed you.”

Billy just stared at him, practically wide-eyed.

“I didn’t mean to-”

“No,” Billy stopped him. “No, yeah. We should. I want to.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, what do-”

“Car. In my car. Be right back.” Steve climbed off him, before leaning back down to kiss him again, hard as he could. 

“Be right back,” he said again.

“_ Go. _”

Steve launched himself off the bed, deflty tucking his otherwise obvious hard-on up under the waistband of his pants, pulling his shirt down, and running out the door. 

Robin had been talked into letting Max braid her hair in exchange for Max teaching her some D&D basics, as she was interested in the game. Max was just explaining the pros and cons of long range weapons at Robin’s desire to be an Elf cleric. 

“...Because if you’re going for more of a long bow type situation-”

Steve fell into the room, completely cutting Max off. 

“Oh, hey, sorry guys.” He panted. 

“Hey, Steve. You ok?” Robin propped herself up on her elbows more. 

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Ok?” Robin tilted her head.

“Cause you weren’t fine, like, twenty minutes ago.” Max offered.

“Uh, well, I’m ok now.”

Robin grinned a little. “What’s got you in such a rush, Harrington?”

Steve was digging through his backpack frantically. “Funny you should ask I, uh, forgot something in the car.”

“What’d you forget?” Max narrowed her eyes. 

“Uhhhhhhh,” Steve found the keys, stood up, dropped them, and picked them up again. “You know. A thing.”

“What kind of thing?’ Robin smiled wider. “Hairspray?”

“Uh, yeah, that.” Steve was not paying attention. “Have fun bye!”

He ran out of the room.

“You think they got back together?” Robin asked her.

“Most definitely.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Just wanna let you know the next chapter is Just Smut TM so I'm gonna be changing the rating to E when I post it and adding a lot of tags BUT if you wanna keep your reading of this PG-13 almost all of the sexy stuff is going to be localized to that chapter so you can just skip it if you want. They're just gonna be straight (gay) fuckin' for aprox. 5000 words and I'll recap any minor plot points at the beginning of the chapter after that. Love you guys! Thank you so much for reading.


	8. Viva Las Vegas, Part 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Two things:  
1: RECAP FOR CONTEXT- If you're just here for the sex, welcome. Here it is. To recap- in the beginning of this fic, Billy and Steve used to date but were broken up at the time of his possession and subsequent almost death. Billy, alive again, plans to run away back to California with Max and Steve and Robin offer to help them, driving there in Steve's car. Both boys have been aimlessly pining for quite a while, and at the end of the last chapter they finally kissed and decided to get back together (even though Steve and Robin are leaving Billy and Max in California) and this is them having sex for the first time in a hotel room in Vegas.  
2: The AIDS crisis. In this scene, Billy and Steve don't talk directly about the AIDS crisis, but I want you to know they've talked about it before, in a previous fic of mine and in my canon for this story. The AIDS crisis was (especially in the 80s) and still is a very serious issue that affects primarily LGBT+ people, African Americans, and lower class people in the US. Medical companies make sex ed, medications, and contraceptives intentionally more expensive and are directly contributing to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Let us never forget those we have lost to AIDS, may they rest in peace and power.

Steve realized as he was running barefoot through the parking lot, diving into his car and rummaging through the glovebox for condoms, that he might have been too obvious talking to Robin and Max. He realized running back that he’d just been more honest to Billy in the warmly lit hotel room than he might ever have been in his life. Like, sure he was a direct person, but that was a profound truth. He wanted to have sex. With a guy. Like he thought that, said it out loud, and could do it right now. 

Because he really fucking wanted to.

There was a painful shattering of something in the back of his mind. Like some old fundamental idea had died, and it hurt for a moment. And then it was gone. And he was free of something he didn't know stood in his way. 

He sprinted shamelessly up the stairs, unable he thought to stand still in an elevator. He knocked on the room door. He didn't know what he expected.

Billy pulled the door open, dragged him inside, and pushed him back onto the bed.

“Got them?” Billy asked.

“Yeah,” Steve managed, holding the box, trying to prop himself up, but Billy kissed him back down. 

“What should we do?” Steve asked, pulling back a little.

“Anything you want, your idea.” Billy slid his hand up Steve’s shirt again, started kissing his neck again.

Fucking hell, he had missed this. He had missed the feeling of Billy’s hands, anywhere, everywhere.

Billy split Steve’s legs apart with his knee, on his hands and knees above him.

“What do you want to do?”

“Anything.”

_ Anything. _

Anything should start with more kissing though, more remembering while doing, more grabbing and pushing and pulling.

Steve started tugging off his own shirt before Billy grabbed it off him himself and threw it across the room. 

He pressed hot, rough kisses to Steve’s collarbone, biting his skin a little, remembering every impassioned noise he knew Steve made. 

Steve started pulling the edges of Billy’s shirt out from the waistband of his jeans before Billy stopped him. Steve looked up. 

“Sorry.”

“No.” Billy swallowed thickly. “No, don’t say sorry.”

Steve waited, trying to understand. “I’ve seen you shirtless-“

“It’s not that. It’s... the scars.” Billy bit the inside of his cheek a little, moving back. “They’re …weird.”

“That’s ok.”

“I just-“

“I don’t have to see them.” Steve pulled both his hands away. “...But I wouldn’t think it was weird if I did.”

Billy didn’t say anything for a bit. 

Then, “Ok.”

Steve pushed himself up more, undoing a couple of the buttons before Billy pushed his hands away to do it himself. 

Steve inhaled a little more sharply than usual as the fabric of the shirt fell away. 

Number five. The real scar, the biggest, the deadly one. Steve watched Billy’s chest rise and fall slightly, the skin of the scar pulling tighter in places. It must be so hard to breathe. 

He raised a hand to touch without thinking but stopped himself, looking up and Billy.

Billy didn’t say anything. 

Steve touched his fingertips to the bright white, pink at the edges, deep and diving gash that cut across the very center of Billy’s chest, slid them across it. It looked like water damaged paper, felt like it too, but it was smooth.

And warm. 

He pressed the flat of his hand to Billy’s chest, reverent. 

“I told you-”

“It’s not weird,” Steve whispered, in such a gentle, almost broken way it made Billy’s heart ache more than the scars ever would. “It just makes me sad.”

Billy lifted his hands to touch the edges of Steve’s extended arm. 

“I’m so glad you’re alive,” Steve said plainly. 

“Yeah… me too.”

Billy bent to kiss Steve again. 

_ I’m alive. _

Steve kissed him back, too, but different than before, with this strange and wonderful sort of abandon that made Billy forget to think, so before he knew it Steve had pushed his head away and was kissing his way down Billy’s stomach, tonguing at the skin above the edge of his jeans. 

“Shit,” Billy breathed. 

Steve grabbed his belt buckle with a hand, palming almost hungrily up Billy’s thigh with the other, relishing the way Billy leaned, harder, into his hands. 

“Let me.” Billy moved his hands over Steve’s at his belt. 

Steve became even more _ painfully _ aware of how hard he was at the metallic sound of Billy undoing his belt buckle. Like Jesus, was there a better sound in the world than the clink, the scrape, the sound of a belt sliding from belt loops to be tossed aside and hit the ground with a thud. Steve felt every muscle so tightly wound in his body it _ hurt _. 

He sat forward to wrap his hands around Billy’s upper thighs, to press his forehead against Billy's exposed stomach, to inhale that bittersweet dark and dirty smell when he tilted his head down to press his face to Billy’s crotch, mouthing aimlessly, desperately, over the tightness in his jeans. 

“Jesus,” Billy murmured, threading his finger’s back through Steve’s hair. 

Steve laughed a little, breathless, flooded with whatever the opposite of adrenaline was, because he felt like his brain was made of water, his body made of fire, like he might pass out at any second but had to just get Billy naked before anything else. 

He threaded jittery fingers under Billy’s waistband-

“_ Steve. _ ”   
“Should I stop?”

“Christ, _ no _.”

Steve undid Billy’s jeans, tugging them down his legs. Billy took the initiative to pull them off entirely.

They’d done this before, a couple of times, but never like this. 

Never like this.

When Steve reach his hands up to pull Billy’s boxers off, it was like he forgot to hit record on his brain. Living like thinking like going and keeping going. No thinking, just doing, just enough time to process anything, everything, just immeaditly getting a hand aroudn the base of Billy’s dick and licking across the tip of it, remembering the taste, feeling his jaw drop a little more, desperate to get back to that feeling of Billy’s dick in his mouth, heavy and hot and hard and _ so fucking good. Breathe, lean forward, more, more, more _. Steve hollowed out his cheeks, he felt his jaw sour, his nose and eyes burn with gagging tears. God this was perfect, his tongue pressed down, back, and the delicious and vile smell of it, of Billy’s dick right there. God he wanted to touch himself, but this was already more than had happened in a while, he didn’t trust himself to keep it together, so he ended up hopelessly palming over his own dick, hard as hell, through his tented sweatpants. 

An hour ago, Billy would not have dared hope Steve would so much as kiss him, let alone be on bent knees in bed sucking him off. 

When they’d done this in the past, it was a lot of guessing and fucking up which was fine because anything together was spectacular anway, but Steve had actually gotten _ better. _ So much better it was unfair, and Billy found himself holding back with great difficulty, feeling Steve’s mouth so wet and hot and _ ready _ around him. 

Steve made a choked sort of gasping sound when Billy pulled him off by the front of his hair. 

Steve looked up, breathing hard, spit trailing out the corner of his mouth, still connecting him to Billy. 

“You good?” Steve asked, a jagged lilt to his voice. 

_ No _, was the first thing Billy thought to say. Definitely not good. Terrible and fucking fantastic, not good. Unsure and confused and scared and beyond happy and really fucking hard but not good. He thought about actually saying something. Something like, how he’d never felt like this before but that was sappy and lame. 

“Yeah,” Billy breathed back, finally. “Yeah, I’m good.”

Steve grinned up at him, sort of electric.

“Can we keep going?” Steve asked him.

“Like how?”

Steve had thought about this a couple of times, jacking off alone in his room. He’d had to think about rethinking all his life choices the first time he’d thought about it. Like, holy shit, was that something he wanted? Was that something he was into?

He’d thought about it more and more after the initial desire, like was fantasizing about anal normal? Was he like, _ that _ gay? He wasn’t even gay, he was bisexual, he constantly reminded himself. There wasn’tt a straight Steve/gay Steve dual personality thing. He was just him, and he wanted to be fucked in the ass. 

The minute he admitted that to himself, alone in his room a couple months ago, he came harder than he ever had alone in his life. 

It had gotten worse from there. He’d thought about it constantly, grinded against his free hand, or Billy’s leg when they would make out.

He wanted Billy to do that to him, for him. 

He wanted that.

“Fuck me.” Steve breathed, the musky salinity of Billy still his primary fixation. 

Billy felt his stomach drop out, had to purposefully refocus his gaze. 

Oh fuck yeah. 

Yeah he wanted to do that. 

More than he had ever wanted anything else, tunnel vision, insane desperation, desire.

“Yeah?”

“Please.”

God, that melted him. 

Billy pushed him back down into the bed, hard, and Steve gasped a little, his hands hitting back against the mattress. 

Billy easily undid the knot of his sweatpants and yanked them down. And Steve was bare ass naked before his very eyes, his dick hot and hard against his stomach. 

Billy might have died all over again. 

“Going commando, huh, Harrington?”

“Easy access, right?” Steve kicked his pants off from around his ankles. 

Billy knew in theory what to do, he’d fucked a decent number of girls and seen enough porn, but he’d never actually done this with a boy before. 

Immediately, he kissed his way down Steve’s chest, his stomach, reaching to touch without thinking. 

Steve jerked back a little when Billy first got a hand on him, moaned, breathy like a laugh when Billy bent to lick up Steve’s dick, still so far without attention.

But after only a couple seconds Steve pushed Billy's head back,

“Wait, wait.”

“You want-”

“Yeah, _ yes _.” Steve nodded, wanting whatever it was Billy was offering. 

Billy shifted his way back up, barely able to focus with the bitterness still sticking to his tongue. 

He leaned back down, collapsing a little from wherever skin met skin, impossibly hard, and kissed Steve again. This was intoxicatingly sloppier though, tasted dirty and glorious like the very city they were together in. Steve’s hands lost gentility, and grabbed at Billy’s skin as if to tear it off, but he was careful to stick to his arms and shoulders, never touching the delicate ache of his chest. Billy slid a hand down Steve’s side, rib cage down past his ass, digging fingers into the skin when he got there. He shifted his grip, wanting to dig his finger in somewhere else, deeper, dirtier.

“This?” Billy started.

“Don’t you think, like, that’s gross, or something?’  
“Steve, _ I’m _ gross.”

“Yeah, I know, just- oh, fuck.” Steve sucked in a breath.

Billy had been told a few times he was good with his hands. That was all with girls though, girls he wasn't particularly into for obvious reasons, so with Steve, beautiful boy Steve made out of bolder lines and stronger angles, saying his name like breathing, broad hands touching him all over, Billy did his absolute best. He coated his index finger with spit and slid it down against Steve’s hole, pressing only slightly - _ “oh fuck” - _before Steve grabbed Billy’s hand and pushed. 

It was hotter than he expected. 

Like, in temperature. 

And in being a real fucking turn on. 

Billy had only been fingering Steve for a couple minutes when he gasped out: “More.”

“More?”

Steve nodded, leaning against the rhythm Billy was working with his finger. He added a second. Steve groaned. 

“Have you done this before?” Billy whispered against Steve’s jawline.   
“Myself, sure- ah.” 

Billy worked it a little harder, pushed his fingers a little farther, absolutely relishing how hot and sticky and gross the whole thing was. Jesus, this was something else. This by itself, wasn't all he wanted, but it was something. It was something after a fever of nothing. A forever of looking and not touching until the couple times Steve and Billy had taken it farther than making out. 

They were both scared, then. Scared of the epidemic no one did anything about. Scared of catching it. 

Scared of themselves. 

But Billy wasn't scared right now. He knew what he was doing, what he wanted. Steve did, too. 

And he was hard as fuck doing it.

Steve whined - Jesus fuck, it was beautiful - when Billy pressed up a little and Billy grinned, validation hitting him like a high. 

“Good?”  
“More.”

“Again?”

“Did I fucking stutter?-” Steve’s voice got bolder. 

Billy liked that. He cut Steve off a little at the end, cut his breath short by pressing him hard against the bed and grabbing one of his legs to haul up so he could finger him again, harder, more, three fingers from the get go.

Steve made a sound that could have been pain or pleasure but grabbed Billy's arm in a way that could only mean the second one. 

“Oh, fuck me,” Steve managed, not so much as a command as an exploitive. He was barely keeping it together. 

“Now?” Billy felt his whole body hum with something like electricity at the thought.

“Wait, ah, a little.” Steve pulled himself down more, relaxed more, getting into it. “Kiss me.”

Billy kissed him, sloppy and rough again, not pulling his hand away. Steve grabbed Billy's shoulders, digging in his fingernails, pulling him down, until he had to break away again. 

“Fuck. I wanna- ah- I wanna come with you inside me.”

Billy might have blacked out if he didn’t need to do just what Steve said so badly. More than anything ever in his life, he needed that. 

Steve was completely naked, on a bed sripped of anything but the bottom most sheet, and was loving every minute of it. 

There was a pressure shift deep in his stomach as soon as Billy had got a finger in him and it was absolutely fantastic. It was a whole new sensation and yet so desperately familiar. Fuck, he needed this. It was like being nauseous in reverse. He needed whatever was happening to keep happening. 

He watched Billy’s face change when he said what he needed

“Are you sure?”  
“Very. Very fucking sure.”

“Steve,” Billy was breathing hard. “We don’t have t-”

“Jesus, Billy!” Steve could have cried for frustration. He pushed Billy’s arm away, which was very counterintuitive and he hated, but he really needed more than this. He pushed billy up and back, onto his back on the bed. 

“Steve-”

“Billy, I know you’re proaby trying to be nice and noble, but unless you want me to stop, now is really not the fucking time.” Steve almost growled.

Steve grabbed the box of condoms from the side table, practically ripped it open, pulling one out, and kissed Billy as had as he could, before looking down, wrapping his free hand around Billy’s dick. 

He’d done this a couple times for himself. Putting a condom on someone else was a whole other kind of hot.

“You’re really hard,” Steve said involuntarily.  
“Yeah, and it’s your fault.”

Steve grinned. 

He licked his own hand, spat on it, very aware that this would hurt like a bicth without any lube, and ran his spit-dripping hand up and down Billy’s dick a few times. 

Billy sighed in an almost pained way.

He probably never thought this would happen. 

It was happening. 

He split his legs across Billy’s hips, knee’s on either side of him.

He could feel the heat of it against the crack of his ass. 

Steve kept a hand on Billy, guiding himself down, ever so slowly, equal parts braced and desperate. Billy’s grip on Steve’s thigh tightened

“Steve,” The word hitched escaping Billy’s mouth when first Steve sank down. 

“Fuck,” Steve almost whined, compeltly overwhelmed. This was it, this was everything he wanted it to be any more. It hurt like a bitch, and was weird, and the best thing he’d ever done. He leaned back into it more and felt a sort of electricity shoot up his stomach. His legs might have gone completely slack if he didn't _ need _ to move. He needed more of whatever was happening. He needed more, deep in his body, like being hungry. 

No, not hungry.

Starving.

He tried to breathe, lean more, feel more, until he was sitting flat against Billy’s hips. Billy felt burning hot inside him, in a way that felt like coming all on its own. 

“Shit, _ Steve _.” Billy’s voice pitch ever so slightly higher. Steve smiled, eyes closed, kinda blissed out thinking how Billy must feel inside him. Jesus, that was a thought.

Steve rocked back a little and a half whimper/half groan broke from his lips. 

“What-” Billy kept trying to ask if he was ok, Steve cut him off by pulling back up sightly and sinking back down. “What should I-”

“Say my name again.” Steve leaned forward, still working a slower rhythm.

“Steve, _ fuck _,” Billy managed. 

“Mm, yeah. Yeah, like that.”

“_ Steve _.” Billy raked his fingernails down Steve’s thighs, 

“_ Fuck _.” He was closer from this than he’d expected. It hurt less and less. He couldn't keep going, though, his legs did really feel unsteady. He leaned forward father to press his forehead to Billy’s.

“I can’t keep going.”

“Are you-”

“Fuck me.” Steve whispered. He might have been shocked at himself for saying it, but it felt better out loud. It felt real and amazing and really fucking hot out loud. “Fuck me, Billy, please.”

Billy had sat up a little, trying desperately not to lose his shit right then and there. He’d fucked a lot of girls. Pretty much everyone knew that. He was definitely trying to make up for something, trying to find something that wasn't there, because it was fun, he guessed, sleeping with girls, but as soon as Steve started riding him he felt like he’d been robbed. Completely denied possibly the best feeling known to man. He might have cried. This was how it was supposed to feel. This absolutely mind blowing near blackout feeling of _ pleasure _ was how it was always supposed to be. This was the itch he couldn't scratch, the missing piece of the puzzle. To be in a hotel room in Vegas with Steve Harrington, sweaty and beautiful, practically panting out that he wanted Billy to fuck him. 

“How?”

“However you want.”

Billy pushed Steve off of him, Steve gasping a little at the sudden change, and pushed him onto his back on the bed. Billy stopped for a moment just to stare. Because Steve was easily pushed onto his back, handsome as hell sprawled on the crumpled up sheets. 

“However I want?”

“However you want.” Steve repeated

Billy grabbed Steve’s legs under the knee and pulled them up over his own thighs, Steve back arched up over the bed. 

“Tell me if it hurts?”

“Not if I like it.”

Coy son of a bitch. 

Billy slid all the way back in, having to actively keep himself together more than he expected.

“Fu-ck” Steve sounded wrecked. 

He gave these rhythmic, guttural moans every time Billy fucked back into him, which is why Billy was surprised when Steve gasped out. 

“Harder. Fuck me harder.”

And again. 

“You’re holding back.”

Shit, he couldn’t, could he?

He could. He could probably do whatever he wanted and Steve would love it, eat it up, because that’s how he was. That’s how they were. 

Billy grabbed one of Steve’s legs, hauling it over his shoulder, sinking deeper than he thought he could go, groaning involentarly at the sight of Steve so compromised, so split apart, and fucked him harder. 

That was better. 

Steve was gasping for air in seconds, fighting with himself over the mixture of still-there pain and the desire for more, more and more. Everywhere hurt, everywhere felt amazing.

“Love you,” Steve blurted as soon as he found words. Apparently, declarations of undying love were a side effect of being fucked too good. “I love you, Billy. I need you to- _ fuck _ \- I need you to know that.”

“I know.” Billy wrapped an arm around Steve’s lower back, pulling him closer, deeper. “I love you, too.”

Steve got his legs wrapped around Billy’s back.

He must have gotten a better angle. 

Rolling moans jerked out of Steve the way his hips and legs jerked, his knees bending, unbending, uneven, hands grabbing for something, anything, dragging at skin on Billy’s arms or balling in the off white sheets of the bed.

_ “Fuck.” _

Steve’s hips tipped up, then down again. 

Billy could drag his nails down Steve’s chest, he could pin his arms back, dip fingers into Steve’s gasping mouth and watch spit drip down his chin, tug his hair in a way that made Steve lose his mind a little. When Billy’s shoulder drew level, he felt Steve press a kiss to it that quickly turned into a bite that pulled the metal of the thin chain always at his neck. 

Billy could touch him anyway he wanted. 

And this was amazing, but Billy probably couldn't hold out for a lot longer, and Steve had asked for something specific. 

His fingers were still wet from Steve’s mouth when he got his hand between them to wrap around Steves dick, thumbing over the precum that was beading from the tip of it. 

That had Steve.

Gasps and moans turned into groans that cracked at their peak went gravely at their lowest and dragged in ecstasy out all from Steve’s lips. Billy was impossibly hard listening to Steve lose his mind because if Billy hadn’t had confidence in himself before, her certainly did now. Steve was barley coherent in a stream of profanity and half sentences of “yes god fuck more more more” and Billy’s name. His name over and over and over like Steve has been waiting to say it, had kept it all bottled up and now here it was like a question like a command. The perfect combination of “fuck me” and “I love you”. 

“_ Billy _.”

It only took a few more seconds. 

Billy could hear Steve’s breathing stall out. He could feel every fibre of Steve’s body clench, bone to muscle to skin to skin. Billy kept jerking him off, his hand, his stomach covered in come, until Steve collapsed back a little against the bed, gasping for air. 

“Fuck.” Steve groaned, his head lolling back a little. 

He didn’t have much time to recover though. 

Billy wrapped both arms around Steve’s back, hauling him up onto his near-useless knees to straddle Billy’s hips again, different angle. 

Steve’s coudn’t even catch his breath before Billy was fucking him again, faster even than before, hard enough that he could hear the rhythmic smack of Billy’s skin against his. It hurt like a burn and felt so fucking good even though by now Steve was spent. 

Billy came with his head pressed against Steve’s chest, Steve pulling him closer, arms wrapped across his shoulders.

His body shuddered when he came, Steve could feel it, could feel his dick twitch even as he kept going. He tipped Billy’s head up to look at as it happened, he wanted to see just how it looked, just how he felt. Billy’s eyelids fluttered, he gave a sound like a wounded animal, as if ecstasy had broken him. 

As if Steve had taken something fundamental from him, or given him something too precious for words. 

They fell back against the bed, sweaty and sticky and exhausted. It hurt more when Billy pulled out but Steve didn’t care. Worth it. So very worth it. 

They shifted apart, Steve smiling like an idiot, overheated and exhausted, when a rapid subconscious need, like panic but different, built up in Billy and he grabbed Steve back into a hug, pulling at his shoulders, tight as he could. And he was crying, shit, he’d started crying. He hated crying. And he didn’t even know why. Maybe for dying, maybe for being alive. Maybe for how horribly guilty he had felt and now how relieved. How many years he’d spent not doing anything only to do everything right now, like was this a horrible mistake or the best thing he could have done and did it even matter now? You can’t take a thing like that back.

“Hey,” Steve pulled back a little, holding Billy’s cheek in one of his hands. Gentle, soothing, son of a bitch. “Hey, woah, It’s ok. You’re ok.”

Billy took a rattling breath that turned into a cough. It made his chest hurt again.

“Billy,” Steve licked his lips, studying Billy’s face. “It’s ok.”

“God, this is stupid.” Billy managed. “Not you, just. The… _ crying _.”

“No. It’s not.” Steve wiped a tear from the ridge of Billy’s cheekbone. “It’s not stupid.”

Billy looked back at Steve for a long moment. Then, he let his head fall forward on Steve’s chest and screwed his eyes shut to say what he needed to say.

“I love you.”

He heard a short laugh shudder through Steve’s chest. “I love you, too.”

Billy sat up, off, away, but Steve kept his hands on Billy’s forearms, fingers spreading, straightening, keeping him _ there. _

Neither spoke for several moments.

“Are you ok?” Billy asked finally.

“Very.” Steve said, letting his legs fall back open. 

Another pause of them just looking at each other. 

“That was… good.” Billy’s eyelids flickered a little. “Great. Amazing.”

“Yeah,” Steve nodded.

Billy kissed him, firm, but gentler than before. He let his hand linger where he’d set it across Steve’s cheek and jaw. Steve brought his own hand up to touch Billy’s.

They could still feel each other’s heartbeats.

Billy sat up more, leaned towards Steve, as if to kiss him again, before ducking down to kiss Steve’s neck, his chest, down the center of his ribcage, and without any sort of warning, lick Steve’s own come off of his stomach. Steve might have gotten hard all over again if it took too long, but it didn't. Billy sat back up in a couple of seconds, wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, catching his breath a little.

His lips were glossy with it for a split second. Steve felt a little like crying. 

“Why’d you do that?”

Billy looked at him, every color of sunlight in the darkened room. 

“I wanted to.”

Billy had absolutely no idea why he wanted Steve’s come in his mouth just then, but it was one of those things he wanted to do. Wanted more than anything in the world. Wanted to taste the slick sticky salty bitter weight of it, wanted to swallow. He’d done it before, he’d sucked Steve off maybe twice, but this was different. Better.

So when Steve asked him why, that’s what he said.

_ “I wanted to.” _

Wanted so much it was a borderline need. 

Billy scanned Steve’s body, pink marks turning red, red marks turning purple. He’d loved that. Loved touching steve where he asked to be touched He kissed a bruise on Steve’s neck. Then on his shoulder. Then another, and another. Every mark on Steve’s body he could reach, he pressed a kiss to, regarding each with an almost sacred air. Precious little things. 

“It doesn’t hurt that bad,” Steve offered.

“Just making sure.”

_ That’s what you wanted, right? That’s how you like it? I did it right? _

Steve traced a hand down Billy’s arm. 

_ Just right. _

Billy layed back down, not really wanting to look away, watching Steve watching him.

He broke Steve’s gaze to get the condom off.

The rubber of it snapped a little against Billy’s hand when he pulled it off.

“That’s a lot.” Steve mumbled

“Yeah,” It dropped, heavy into the trash by the bed. “I haven't come in like a week. Side effect of dying is apparently subdued sex drive.”

“Sucks.” Steve closed his eyes, pulling Billy closer when he layed back down. “I could've helped.”

“Oh yeah?’

“Sure. If you asked real nice we could have hauled up in some rest stop bathroom for fifteen minutes, like we did that one time in May.”

Billy laughed a little. 

Billy never would have asked. He’d have felt too bad, or been too… dunno. Ashamed?

It sank in in parts what they’d done together, for Billy, until it hit him hard in the best way.

He’d had sex with a guy. Not just any guy, one he was in love with, one who loved him. Something he never thought he’d ever get to do, never thought he’d be able to do. And there Steve was, coming down off a high like no other, covered in sweat, his own spit on his chin, Billy’s spit on his stoamch, smiling stupid and exhausted right next to him. Billy could have swore he glowed, that they both did. He reached out a had to hold Steve’s head, jaw, neck. Just touch him, feel how sticky and hot his skin was. How real. 

He still needed to get to California, but this. This was something he never knew he needed, or never wanted to admit. But now he had it. He felt a low laugh bubble up from Steve’s throat. 

“What are you thinking about?” Steve asked.

“Do you have to ask?”

“I’m thinking about how I’m gonna explain all these fun bruises,” Steve gestured lazily to his own neck. “Some of them are very distinctly bite shaped.”

Billy laughed a little at that.

“I’m thinking about you, I guess.” Billy said finally.

“What about me?”

Billy licked his lips, thinking. “I don’t think you’re a bad boyfriend.”

“What?” Steve woke back up more.

“You said something like, Nancy told you you’re a bad boyfriend. And you kept saying it. They whole time we were together. Like it was some inside joke but, you know, you’re not.”

“Not a bad boyfriend?”

“Yeah.”

“...I was your boyfriend?” Steve had that look he got sometimes, like his heart was even more on his sleeve than usual. 

Billy looked at him, more serious now. “‘Course.”

Steve looked at once elated and very very sad.

“You never said, so I, you know, I didn’t know.”

“You never asked,” Billy said first. “But, I should have told you, I guess. You don’t get anything unless someone tells you straight up, huh?’ He teased.

Steve smiled. Like an angel on earth.

“Guess not.”

Billy looked at him for a while, studying his face, his expression, exhausted, euphoric, and trying to commit it to memory, because tomorrow was their last full day together. 

The last day. 

“Take me back.”

Steve smiled even wider. 

“For a _ day _ ?”   
“Yeah. For a day.”

“Ok.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Silence, then,

“You should try to sleep.” Steve mumbled, half asleep, aware that Billy wasn’t.

“I don’t sleep anymore.”

“Try.” Steve shifted closer to touch more of Billy with more of himself, not hot or cold, just gently warm. “For me.”

Billy tried. 

And as much as he expected to be gripped with the chest constricting nightmares he’d gotten used to avoiding, he didn’t really dream about anything at all. He just listened to Steve breathing, glad to not be dead, until he fell asleep.

  



	9. Now Entering California

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a sweet fluff chapter with big feelings and lot of it might read like an unabashed love letter to California and thats because it is! I fucking love my home state you guys.   
Also cool fun game I like to play with myself whenever I write anything: how many call me by your name references can I fit in one thing? so far in this fic I think ive got like, four total. maybe five.   
also I briefly didn't know how this fic was gonna end and had a crisis but we got it now, so, you know, prepare. take care of yourself. brace your heart.

Steve had woken up next to Billy before, but never like this. Never totally naked, never warm all over.

Never so specifically sore.

Steve desperately needed a shower. His ass hurt like a bitch but he didn't really mind. Getting out of bed and feeling his body twinge just reminded him of how good it felt to get here. He looked over his shoulder at Billy. 

He was still fully asleep. His eyelashes fluttered a little. His hand rested idle on the bed where Steve had just been, even in his sleep, looking for a way for them to be close. 

One of his svelte legs was comeply exposed to the pale sunlight, the hair along it going gold.

Steve could have stayed in bed forever, or just stayed staring at Billy, who really looked like one of those old eurpoean statues sometimes, even if he was less built, even if he’ lost too much weight. Still stunningly handsome. But Steve needed to get the rest of the tackiness of come and dried sweat off his skin.

He smiled a bit, stepping around the various articles of discarded clothing. They’d really gone at it, he laughed to himself. 

Steve scrubbed his whole body clean, and almost got more tired because of it. The water in Las Vegas was even softer than in Hawkins, like being under a deluxe waterfall. 

He heard the bathroom door open just as he was rinsing off. Billy, still half asleep and still totally naked, leaned against the edge of the shower

“Hey,” Steve smiled at Billy, who yawned and pushed his non-existent hair back out of habit.

“Mind if I join you?”

“Sure.” Steve stepped back a little. 

Steve thought about all the times they’d done this, showered, before they were together. Billy being a dick, Billy ignoring him, Billy being a dick by ignoring him. He’d probably seen Billy naked a million times. But this was special. This was Billy, exhausted from the insane amount of fucking they’d done, rinsing off in the shower next to him, in close quarters, just the two of them.

“You sleep ok?” Billy asked.   
“Yeah.”

Billy nodded, waking up more. “Good.”

Steve stepped closer to Billy, wrapped wet ams around him, mostly because he realized he could. He liked the feeling of his whole body, uninterrupted, pressed up against Billy’s. Different than last night. More like feeling out where he ended and Billy began, rather than losing the boundary. Just as intimate. Just as good.

Steve tucked his chin into the crook of Billy’s collar. Billy laughed a little, pulling Steve closer, and there it was. The low, crackling laugh, The one Steve had missed so bad. The one that meant Billy was smiling, happy from deep down. 

They ended up making out for a bit against the shower wall, under the warm water as the bathroom filled with steam. 

They stopped before either of them got too into it. Billy pushed a strand of wet hair from Steve’s face.

“You’re beautiful,” He murmured, bringing back that wonderful nowhere land they’d been in last night, just for a second. Where you could say anything, do anything. 

Steve kissed the ridge of his shoulder. 

Everything about them, in the early morning, together in the shower, was so tender to Steve. No one, not even Nancy, who he really considered his first love, had felt like this to him. Equal parts rough, passionate, and gentle, dear. A precious thing. Sacred, maybe.

And Steve liked the way the warm water got warmer where it hit Billy's skin, where it pressed against his own.

After they were both dressed, basically ready to go, Steve went through his full hair routine, and Billy mocked him the entire time. 

“You’re just bitter you don’t have hair anymore,” Steve shot back when he was done and Billy pushed him and pretty soon they were mock wrestling which turned into more kissing. They couldn’t get enough of each other. Like they’d made their own pocket dimension in that hotel room where they could really and truly do whatever they wanted. 

Steve would have liked to order room service and gotten Billy to feed it to him or something like that but they had to get back on the road. Today was the day. With any luck, they’d been in California 

“What time is it?” He yawned, laying on the destroyed bed.

“There is literally a clock two inches from your head.”

Steve turned to look at the digital alarm clock on the bedside table. “Oh cool. There's an hour left for free breakfast.”

“Thank fuck. I’m starving.”

Billy got up off the bed, fixing his collar, a hand out to help Steve up when the phone rang. 

Steve looked at it. 

“I’ve basically decided I hate phones.”

Billy laughed a little. “You should still answer it. It’s not even the same one.”

Steve sighed heavily before picking up.

“Hello?”

“Hi Steve,” A warm and familiar voice. “It’s Joyce Byers.”   
Steve sat up, confused, already smiling. “Hey! Mrs. Byers. What’s, uh, what’s up? How’s Will?”

“Oh, he’s fine. Everyone’s fine. I just- well I heard… quite frankly I heard what people are saying about you and your friend, Billy.”

She didn’t say it with venom or suspicion though. She said it in a way that made Steve feel like a little kid. People look out for kids. He knew he did. 

“I thought, you know, Hawkins isn’t particularly kind to people that are different, I know that better than most. And I really have always appreciated how nice you are to my little boy, you know that.”

“Uh, yeah.” Steve managed, suddenly overcome with emotion. 

No one had talked to him like that about this yet. Like maybe he was barely an adult who might need help. Like maybe he deserved help for how much he did for other people. He started crying. Silently, and with great difficulty, but still crying. Because no one who had called him from home had talked to him like this, like someone bigger than him who really honestly cared. Billy saw. He made a face like,  _ Hey, are you ok? _

Steve didn’t know really how to respond, listening to Mrs. Byers over the phone. 

Without any sort of prompting, Billy sat right next to Steve on the bed and pulled him into his arms. Steve realized as he leaned back against Billy’s chest that he really needed that. He needed to not have to hold his own, just because he could. It was nice to have help.

“I just wanted to say,” Joyce kept going. “I know you might not have a lot of grown-ups looking out for you right now, but you can always come to me, Steve. If you need to talk, or you know anything. I gotcha.”

Steve tried to even out his voice, feeling Billy’s arms tight across his shoulders. 

“Thanks, Mrs. Byers. That, um... That means a lot.”   
“Of course, kiddo.”

There was a long silence even after Mrs. Byers hung up where Steve felt Billy’s heartbeat against his back and closed his eyes to listen better. 

Billy tucked his chin on top of Steve’s head.

“She’s nice.”

“Yeah,” Steve wiped his eyes with a sleeve.

“She’s Jonathan's mom too, right?”

“Yeah?”

“Didn’t you break his camera in the parking lot?”

“I got him a new one! And how do you even know that?”

Billy shrugged. “People said you were like, a douchebag.”

“Yeah well you beat me out on that fucking front.”

“I beat you out on a lot of fronts, Harrington.”

Steve pushed him off. Billy laughed and just grabbed him into a hug again. “Not so fast.”

Steve struggled uselessly, laughing, until they agreed to actually go down for breakfast. They had to make sure no one else was in the hallway first. 

Billy was eating his weight in dry cereal (mostly Lucky Charms) and drinking a coke as Steve drank black coffee and ate an apple when Max and Robin appeared downstairs. 

Small talk of other hotel goers gave the dining room a warm, social feel that Steve hadn't felt in a while. Like the outside world was a welcoming place, or at least a place you were welcome in. 

“Did you smell the complimentary hand soap?” Was Robin’s first deadpan question to Steve.

“Of course. Loved it.”

“I thought you would.” She sat down next to him, yawning as Max walked off to get a pop tart. 

“Good morning Billy.” She smiled at him across Steve.

“Buckley.” He nodded at her. 

“How far are we from home?” Max reappeared with every possible variety of both pop tart and breakfast pastry stacked on her one plate. 

“Five or six hours.” 

“So close yet so far. I am not excited to drive.”

“I could drive.” Billy said, thinking it as he said it.

“What?”

“Yeah, gimme the keys I’ll get us there.”

“Billy, you don’t have to-”

“You don’t even know where in San Diego we’re going.”   
So Billy was going to drive. 

Taking stuff from the hotel to the car was quite tragic, as everyone had decided yesterday was their favorite day of the trip so far, and no one really wanted to leave, but they all sort of  _ needed _ to get to California at that point. 

Steve was talking to Robin on the way back up to get the last of their things about Live Aid again (she’d seen it though. They watched it together, remember, Steve?) when she cut him off.

“Are you hungover?”

“What? No. Why?”

“You sound hungover. Your voice is like, half gone.”

“Oh,” Steve avoided her gaze, clearing his throat. “You know, it’s just uh-”

The way he turned his head meant the collar of his shirt shifting away from his neck slightly, exposing the edge of a purple mark to Robin’s gaze.

“And what’s this-?” Robin stopped him at the top of the stairs, reached up to pull the collar of Steve’s polo down, revealing what was unmistakably a very very dark hickey.

Steve grabbed her hand away and she gasped at him. 

“ _ Steve.” _

“Robin, don’t-”

“Oh my god-”   
Billy and Max reappeared, carrying what they had just confirmed was the last of the stuff, so Robin had to opt for mouthing ‘oh my god’ over and over at Steve when no one else was looking. 

Loading the car, for the last time, Steve briefly found himself alone with Max outside the hotel. 

“Hey, Max, how’s it going?” Steve said probably too energetically.

“I don’t care if you slept with my brother just don’t talk about it, ok?” She pulled a face at him, all disgust. 

Steve didn’t have anything to say to that.

They got gas in a town called Roach. Everyone had fun saying it, it was a top contender for weirdest town name they’d hit so far, up there with Beaver Dam and Slit.

Billy disappeared to the bathroom while the rest of them picked out snacks. Robin thought she should check in with Steve, but wasn't too worried. He’d been in a practically chipper mood all morning, sporting more than one hickey she’d noticed.

“So, how’d it go?” She started.

“Last night?”

“Yeah. Seemed like you had fun.”

“Yeah,” Steve smiled. “Glad I don’t have to drive ‘cause it hurts to sit down, but I mean, you only live once-”

“Steve,  _ what _ ?” Robin stopped him.

“What?” He looked at her, confused.

“What did you just say to me?”

“...You only live once?”  
“_Before_ _that_.”

“Oh,” Steve was obviously trying not to blush but failing oh-so-miserably. “I- it’s um-”

Robin pulled Steve down a little behind the isle divider. “Steve, did you-?”

“It’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big deal?!” She whispered as fiercely as possible.   
“It’s not like I’ve never had sex before!”   
“You hade  _ sex _ ?!” Robin hissed. “Do you have any idea how dangerous-”

“I mean we used protection-”

“I can’t  _ believe  _ I'm having this conversation with you-”   
“I thought you knew!-”

“Hey,” Max called over the isle. Robin and Steve popped back up.

“Do you guys want regular corn nuts or BQ?”

“Regular is fine, thanks Max,” Robin said quickly before yanking Steve back down.

“I thought that’s why you brought it up!” Steve picked back up, quieter than before.   
“No, Steve. I thought you were gonna tell me something sweet and- and not completely impulsive and insane! Like how you made out after admitting you feelings for each other! Or maybe - at worst - a blowjob or something-”   
“We did talk admit out feelings! Just… you know… during.”   
“I hate you. I’m so proud of you and I hate you so much.”

“Why are you proud of me?”

“Because! That’s exciting! And also ew!”

“I wouldnt say ‘ew’ if you had sex with a girl-”

“I hate men, Steve! The male form disgusts me-!”   
“What’re you guys talking about?” Billy appeared at the end of the isle, clearly amused at the sight of Steve being pulled by his collar to sitting on the floor next to Robin.

“Nothing major,” Steve said.

Robin stared at Billy, then at Steve, then back again.

“You good, Buckley?” Billy asked

Robin dragged the skin under her eyes with her fingertips. “I can’t look at either of you.”

“Steve told you?” Billy grinned. Jesus, he looked so evil and so cute.

“I didn’t mean to-”   
“What are you guys doing?” Max came around the other side of the isle. 

“They’re being weird, dunno why.” Billy pointed easily to Robin and Steve before walking around them to pay for the snacks Max had picked out.

Steve sighed sort of dreamily, staring off in Billy’s direction.

Robin flicked his neck and he winced.

“That  _ really _ hurts.” He told her. 

“Whose fault is that?”

Robin hoped this was the end of her involvement with whatever went down last night that had Steve so bubbly and Billy so smug. 

But Billy wasn’t all confidence. 

In a moment of pensiveness, he snagged her outside the latest gas station. 

“Robin.”

“Oh, so you know my first name now?” Robin turned to him, eyebrows raised.

He grabbed her arm

“Hey!-”   
And dragged her around the corner of the gas station.

“You know it’s rude to drag people places-”   
“I need to talk to you.”

“Why?”

“Because.”

“About what? Steve? Like, last night?”

“No. Yes. I don’t know.”

“You two really are the perfect match-”

“Shut up for a second!”

“No.”

“Just, _god-_ _please_. Please just, don’t talk for two fucking seconds.”

Robin didn’t talk.

Billy wiped the sweat from his upper lip with a free hand. He looked down, then up, then at Robin trying to articulate.

“I just… feel. Weird.”

“Well, I mean, it’s completely understandable if you’re experiencing guilt or even regret-’

“No. Not that.”

“Ok? Um, maybe some internalized homophobia-”

“Less big words, please Buckley.”

“Ok…”

“I feel weird like. I’m fine.”

“...ok.”

“I don’t feel better, but I don’t feel worse. I just feel fine. Normal.”

“And that’s… weird?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, before- with girls- I’ve felt sort of… I don’t know… gross.”

“Makes sense.”

“And now I don’t feel ungross. I just feel sort of fine.”

“I think maybe that’s a good thing?”

Billy snapped again. “Why am I even talking to you? You’re a virgin dyke-”

“Oh, get a fucking therapist then! No one said I  _ wanted _ to talk to you-.”

“You should get a fucking therapist!” He shot back.

“Yeah, Billy! I know! We should all be in therapy! But instead? We’re in Nevada. So if you want to talk to me, then talk to me. And don’t be a douchebag!”

Billy sighed heavily, leaned against the concrete wall, still cool from the shade of the night before. 

“I’m sorry.” He mumbled. 

“Thanks.” Robin nodded. “...And you’re gonna be fine.”   
“You are very optimistic.”

“Well, if you stay alive long enough, eventually you’ll be fine.”

“You think so?”

“Sure. I’m doing it.”

Billy looked back at Robin, examining her. He nodded a couple of times, understanding.

“Thanks.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome.”

Billy and Max’s conversation about it was the shortest of all. 

Between the mini mart and the car:

“Did you guys get back together?” She was eating a redvine. 

“Yeah.”

“Called it.”

“Good for you.”

That was all. 

Steve remembered the saying ‘you don’t miss something till it's gone,’ but he felt more like you didn't miss something till it was gone and you had it  _ back _ .

There were a million things Steve had missed about Billy, like the faces he made or his fucked up sense of humor or the weird california-isms that slipped into the way he spoke, but he somehow missed them even more now that he had them back, thinking  _ Jesus, how did I survive without those looks and those words and that smile... _

The was just how he felt now, sitting shotgun as Billy inched the speedometer up to 80 on an empty and golden west coast highway. 

He was back. He was different, but that was ok, because here he was, something closer to whole, something closer to ok, something alive.

Someone. Back again.

Billy was tapping his fingers on the underside of the steering wheel absentmindedly, humming along to a Generation X tune, when he shot a glance sideways at Steve and grinned.

Steve laughed out loud. It used to be like this in Hawkins sometimes; the exhilaration of going too fast with music that was too loud that you couldn’t hear over the wind from the rolled down windows anyway. It just made you want to laugh. Like you could echo what the wind was doing.

There was that little version of the world again; everything the same, just him and Billy the only two people on the planet. 

What a time to be alive.

At one point, Billy’s hand went absent-mindedly from the gear shift to Steve’s knee, where he had it crossed up over his other leg. Robin noticed right away. Max next, but both of them silently agreed not to say anything because they doubted Steve had noticed; he was talking uninterrupted, impassioned and animated about baseball. 

It was nice to have everyone happy for once. 

It took them four days and three nights, but they made it. Steve suggested they pull over at the “Now Entering California” sign, but Billy yelled ‘nope!’ over the music and sped right past it. 

Max cheered, though, which got everyone cheering and whooping and banging on the ceiling of the car.

They startled some birds.

California missed Billy. He could tell as soon as they drove in. This kind of fresh air actually made it to his lungs, this kind of backlit heat actually made him feel warmer. He was closer to being alive, closer to the fire. 

He glanced at Steve, who was still talking, rapid and opinionated with his ‘I’m being reasonable' tone.

It made Billy smile. 

As soon as they passed the sign, Max pulled out her Player’s Handbook. 

She flipped through it, searching for whatever Lucas had told her not to look for, and saw all his markups throughout, tabs he’d left checked in case she wanted to see what he’d been thinking about, and then in the back, on a blank page, notes.

Notes from everyone. 

About how they missed her. 

About how much they cared about her.

About how happy they were for her. 

_ Good luck, Mad Max.  _

“Hey, you ok?” Robin asked her. 

“Yeah,” Max wiped her face on her sweatshirt sleeve. “They, um, they all signed it.”

“That’s so sweet.” Robin read a couple over Max’s shoulder. “Wish I had friends like that when I was your age.”

“Yeah,” Max smiled to herself. 

It was sweet. And terribly, terribly sad. 

Conversations bled together after a few days. They could have brought up any topic from any time, because this really was a journey now. 

But something Billy and Max had mentioned a few times came up again.

“-The best burger you will ever have in you  _ life. _ ” Max was saying.

“I seriously doubt-” Robin tried. 

“No, Max is right.” Billy cut her off. 

“There are so many burgers in the world-”

But they got to an in n out. 

Robin asked what was up with the two twisty palm trees out front. 

“Trademark.”

They drive thru-ed it.

Billy pointed at max.    
“Cheeseburger animal style fries chocolate shake.” She rattled off. 

“Great.” Billy turned to Steve. “You like pickles, get something animal style.”

“What does animal style mean-?”   
“Buckley, you like pickles?”

“Sure.”

Max helped walk them through the rest of the menu. 

The girl who took their order was crazy bubbly said ‘right on’ when Billy confirmed what they wanted.

“They’re legally required to say that.” Max said as soon as they pulled forward. 

“That’s insane.”

“This is and  _ experience _ .”

Two double-doubles two cheeseburgers, one animal style, six orders of fries, three milkshakes, no four, no, three. 

“I’m not getting a milkshake I've been eating like shit-” Steve insisted. 

“You have to!” Max told him.

Steve got a milkshake. 

And it didn’t break the bank. 

“How is this all so cheap?” Was Robin’s main concern.    
“Just try it.”

There was a whole five minutes of total silence, broken by Steve saying. 

“Yeah, this is the best burger I’ve ever had in my life.”

Max had told him so.

They did end up going in the In n Out anyway, bathroom break, and Robin got a chance to examine the middle of nowhere California town landscape as it compared to her Indiana version of the same thing.

The air smelled sweet whenever they got out of the car, like maple syrup or honey and dust or wood. The sun was less scorching than in Nevada or Arizona, less like an open flame, more like an oven warmed-kitchen. The ground felt like clay in places, perfectly smooth. 

Robin liked California, she decided. It felt… open. Like leftover cowboy mojo from the 1800s still existed on the many roads. Max caught a lizard to show her and Steve, with a little grass loop tied around she its neck. 

Billy was oddly quiet. Not the same, empty quiet like before, but a new, real quiet, like he just didn’t feel like talking.

Except to Steve. 

Who he kept making small, hushed exchanges with that always got Steve grinning at him. 

It was insufferable. 

Robin played it way cooler than she could have when both boys disappeared for ten minutes at a rest stop. Max decided to lay on a rock (there were so many big flat rocks) in the California sunshine- just like a lizard herself- and Robin was just walking vaguely around the parking lot, trying to wake back up her left foot, when Steve made for the bathroom, and, come to think of it hadn't Billy just disappeared that way a couple seconds prior?

Maybe nothing happened. Billy came back by himself, kicked Max in the leg (not hard), pulled a couple leaves out from where they’d gotten hooked under the edge of the windshield, and sat down in the driver’s seat to consult the map. So probably nothing. 

Except for Steve coming back, clearly exhausted, trying not to smile, taking a million years to respond to anything Robin said. 

Something definitely happened. 

Robin has seen enough boys staggering out of the one lockable bathroom in the band room to know what ‘I just got a blowjob’ looked like. 

“You’re such a dingus.” 

“Hm?”

“I said you’re a complete and total dingus, Steve.”

He wasn’t listening. 

She snapped a couple times in front of his face, trying to get him to focus

“What-  _ what _ ?” He leaned away from her a little, finally paying full attention.

Robin just rolled her eyes.

Nothing had to be said. 

Steve kept grinning at Billy, who kept pushing him, which kept getting them both laughing, in the car or at any given stopping point, and it was dumb, and obvious, but no one was around besides Max who ignored them and Robin who didn’t care, other than to yell 

“You boys play nice!” across the parking lot. 

For maybe the only time in their lives, they were nowhere. They were no place on earth that anything mattered outside of what mattered to them. 

Hawkins, a place Steve had lived all his life, seemed so blissfully faraway. He didn’t dislike Hawkins, it was just, you know, same-old same-old. Too familiar for comfort. And now it might be dangerous. 

This was almost too different for comfort. But you could go anywhere and never run into anyone you knew, never care what mini mart cashier saw you making heart eyes at another boy on your way out, because he didn’t know who you were, he’d never see you again, and who would he tell anyway? 

Nothing mattered unless you said so.

They crested some mountains- the mountains were huge and jagged and never ending, like something out of a desert-y fantasy novel Steve might here Dustin talk about - and there was the ocean. 

Steve had seen the ocean in new york once when he was a kid. His family has flown out for the holidays. But it was grey and cold and not particularly visible or spectacular. 

This was so much different, so much better. 

It was a vast, glittering blue and white and reflective sea - literally. It was like if shattered glass meant no ill will. And it went on forever. It met the horizon and kept going. 

Steve tore his eyes away from it to look at Billy, see his reaction. 

He was leant forward slightly, over the steering wheel, eyes fixed ahead, almost motionless. Steve had never seen him like that- it was something close to calm. A fine and natural calm. 

He stayed calm, too, for the hour it took to get to that neverending sparkly blue. 

Billy smelled the ocean before he saw it. With the windows rolled down he could feel the salinity in the air, he could smell it like tasting it. 

Robin tried to tell him it would make more sense if they went straight to San Diego, it would take less time, but he flat out ignored her to ask max if she was dressed for the beach. 

When they got there, when they finally parked in the sand strewn parking lot of some beach town’s main drag, Billy didn’t notice anything else anyone said or did, not Robin noting their location, not Steve’s hand on his shoulder, not Max getting out of the car almost as quickly as he did. 

He just started at the water.

There it was.

He could hear the quiet, eternal roar. 

This was it.

He could feel the stray sand bracing his feet from burning against the concrete as he tugged off most of his clothes to toss back into the car. 

He was back.

Running across the beach, feeling the hot sand under his feet in the cooling air was like the opposite of surreal. This was reality, this right here. Everything that had happened over the past year might have been a bad dream, because here was the beach here was the water, and it was all just the same. 

As if no time had passed at all. 

Like he had been on some other planet he was never supposed to go to, and time had not passed, and now it could start again. It could move forward again. 

He might have been scared, he realized. Black and cold water was something he was afraid of now, and what he remembered the ocean to be at night. He had hoped to keep the ideas separate in his brain, but he might not be able to.

This was different. 

This water was blue and green and really bright in the high up sun and it crested white just like he remembered and it was cool against his hot skin like he remembered and every doctor that had talked to him back in hawkins had warned him against swimming soon or at all because of breathing and moving but he dove into the first wave deep enough to get him all the way under. 

And he was back. 

Maybe not all the way forever, but for right now, in the loud silence of the Pacific, he was back.

Breaking back up out of the water, lungs only burning a little, salt water tingling his scarred skin, he was just in time to hear max calling to him as her feet washed up water and she came wade-running out to him.

He grabbed her hands when she was close enough, pulling her out farther. She screamed again, half laughing half freezing when he picked her up, making like he’d throw her in. 

“Put me down! Put me down!”

He mock dropped her and she punched him in the chest.

“Watch it!”

“Put me down then!”

He did. 

She jumped on his shoulders, trying to pull him down. 

They’d never been to the beach together he realized. It was nice. He usually went alone before.

But now they were here together, both in their element. 

Billy’s literal element. 

This was his.

He wanted to swim out to the bouys and back, but considering his only just healed lungs and general scarring that was probably a bad idea. So he stayed where Max could touch. She dove under a swell, and the water droplets that clung to her eyelashes when she came back up looked even more golden than usual. 

She grinned at him with all her teeth. He splashed her, she splashed back. 

This was theirs.

“Where even are we?” Steve asked Robin, they were both still at the car, watching the scene on the beach like it was a family reunion. 

“San Clemente, apparently.” Robin shoved the map aside, clambering out of the car. 

“You getting in? He asked her, already pulling off his shirt.

“I dunno-”

“What? You have to!”

“I mean-”

Steve dragged her down to the water with him. 

“Get in!” Was the consensus from those already in the water. 

Steve was game. 

Robin was not.

She had tentatively approached the water’s edge.

She stuck a foot in and grimaced.

“It’s cold! I thought Califnorna was supposed to be hot!”   
“It’s warmer in San Diego, but it’s the Pacific Ocean.” Max yelled back.

“Come on,” Steve walked up behind Robin, grabbing her hand. “When in Rome, right?”

Robin made faces at him, which only made Steve laugh - nothing in the world could ruin this mood - but still let herself be led into the water. 

Steve was simultaneously impressed and underwhelmed by the ocean. 

It was vast and all that, went on forever technically, but it was also just water. Salty water. Kinda cool.

It was like the opposite of seeing the desert for the first time. You could just look out over it forever, but thee you were, in one spot, on the edge. 

“What’d you think?” Billy asked him.

If he’d thought Billy was easy on the eye before, - which he did - he was a total knockout now, already getting color back, standing with his shoulders back, just toned enough to be noticable, water clinging to his skin.

His eyes were the same color of blue as the water around them wherever it caught the light of the sun. 

“It’s nice.” Steve replied evenly, thinking how nice it would be to kiss right now, knowing that wasn't allowed. 

Billy smiled at him a little. Thinking the same thing.

The water was nice, too, especially after hours in the stifling hot car. Cold in a way that made you feel totally awake, clear headed. 

“It is cold though.”

“It’s cause you’re not moving.” Billy told him, brushing his arm as he waded around him, deftly. Steve felt kind of clunky in water, aware of the resistance around him. Billy wasn't like that. He moved through water like he was made for it, or like it was made for him. “If you were swimming or surfing or something you wouldn’t be cold.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this happy.” Steve murmured to him. 

Billy smiled, smug as ever. 

Max convinced them to try a game of chicken, Californians vs. Hoosiers. 

Max and Billy won in seconds, knocking not only Robin over but Steve with her. 

They switched partners and the winning factor was actually max, who claimed eternal victory. 

Turns out there were loads of ways to pass the time at the beach, they stayed hours longer than they meant to. 

Drying off outside the car, less than an hours to sunset, Max asked Billy:

“Did it work?”

“Did what work?”

“The beach. Do you feel better?” 

“Yeah. I do.”

Max leaned her shoulder against him. “Me too.”

He tousled her hair. 

It wasn't just the beach, either. It was a whole bunch of things that sort of, worked themselves out in time. And he wasn’t all the way better, but god, was he ever closer than three days ago. 

Everything he didn’t like to think about seemed so far away. 

Out here, out west, there was just him and the people he cared about at the ocean. 

That was what he needed. 

“Thanks for, you know, bringing me.” Max said.

“What, like I’d leave you in that hellhole.”

“You could have.”

He considered her. “Not now I couldn’t.”

“Yeah. Still.”   
“Thanks for bailing with me.”

She smiled. “No problem.”

No matter how far away he got from his problems, Billy was probably always going to be decently fucked up, he was just more ok with that now.

But he didn’t want that for Max. 

You can’t be alive if you don’t have anything to live for. 

So he’d stay alive for himself, and for Max, and make sure she never got as fucked up as he was.

That’s what families were supposed to do, and she was family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's my in n out order:   
protein style animal style grilled cheese (I'm allergic to wheat :/ ), animal fries, coffee float (thats like a root beer float but with coffee instead of soda sometimes they won't make it tho) and a million extra sides of spread. maybe another order of fries.   
Also: in n out is currently supporting the ~current president~ 's re-election campaign so maybe don't go to in n out for a few months if you's in California. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Love u guys.


	10. Sandy Eggo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter title is actually one of the names for SD given by the locals, not an st reference. wild  
also this was part of one long ass chapter that I just decided to split in two so here's the first half on a night in San Diego

Billy driving all of them into San Diego county was an experience in its own right. 

He had never taken speed limits very seriously, honked at the drop of a hat, tailgated and brightsed two people, and cut across three lanes of traffic (no signal) to make an exit. 

If it hadn't been Steve’s car, he might just be thinking about how in love he was. Instead, he was riddled with anxiety. 

“Do you have to drive like this, man?”

“You never cared before,” Billy was even more devilish with sunglasses on. “And everyone here drives like this. It’s a California thing.”

“That was your car! This is my car!”

Billy laughed at him. “Revenge is sweet, Harrington.”   
  


Even as Billy said it, he knew he didn’t need or want revenge. Well ok, he still wanted revenge a little, but so many more things were more important. Like Steve helping him and Max get the hell out of Hawkins, and forgiving him, and last night...

Alright but nothing’s more important than the Camaro, may she rest in peace. 

So maybe they were just, you know, equal. 

That worked. 

“We HAVE to go to Belmont Park.” Max grabbed Billy’s shoulder when he refused her the first time. 

“We don’t have time, dipshit. Or money.”   
“But they’ve never been! And it’s right there!”

“Max-”

“When are we all gonna be here again?” Max turned to the backseat - she’d switched into front at the In -N-ut - to talk to Robin and Steve. “It’s this dope ass boardwalk type deal, with a pendulum ride, and an  _ amazing _ arcade-”

“And it’s all the way the fuck out by _Mission_ _Beach_ and a total ripoff.” Billy cut her off.

“The worlds oldest wooden roller coaster,” Max ignored him. “Total deathtrap, very fun, called the Big Dipper-”

“The Giant Dipper.” Billy corrected her. 

“What? No.”

“Yes, it is, Max.”   
“Fuck you it’s not-”

“Why don’t we just go, and find out?” Robin cut in, in an attempt to pacify the two of them. 

“Don’t encourage her, Buckley-”

“The lights are so pretty right after sunset.” Max said more evenly.

Billy sighed. “Fine. One ride. One.” He held up a finger in Max’s face. She grabbed his wrist but he just pushed her back by the head. 

“You’re the literal worst.” She said when she finally slapped his hand away. 

“Don’t thank me too much.” 

They drove through the back of Pacific Beach, not quite there yet, down the 5, which everyone argued over. 

“ _ The  _ 5?”   
“Yeah,  _ the  _ 5.”

“It would just be 5. You don't say take  _ the  _ 8th street or some shit like that.”

“Well it’s not a street name, is it, Steve.”

“It’s-”   
“Are  _ you  _ from here? No, you’re not.”

“Ok but grammatically-”

“It’s just regional slang, Robin.”

And why didn’t Billy want to go to Belmont Park anyway? It wasn't that far away. 

“The freeway exits are a bitch because of SeaWorld.”

“OH MY GOD, SEAWORLD?”

“Yeah, which is closed.”

“Steve, SeaWorld is bad.” Robin told him. 

“What could be bad about an actual real life shark tank?”

“The sharks are stuck in the tank. Sharks belong in the ocean.”

“But. Shark tank! Like in a Bond villain lair!”   
“If you were a shark-”

“Let me have this.”

“No! If you were a shark…”

Despite Steve’s insisting that he was not a shark, nor did he ever intended to be a shark, that was the argument that got them to the string-light-lit miniature amusement park that was Belmont Park. 

The license plate game got intense in the parking lot, the place was a total tourist attraction. 

“That one’s from Canada.”

“Hey! Indiana!” 

“Fucking Zonies,” Billy remarked at a terrible parked Subaru. 

“‘Zonies?”   
“Arizonians. I get that there’s you know, one fucking road in all of Arizona. But you’d think they’d be better drivers.”

Steve laughed.

Belmont Park  _ was _ pretty at night. It was kinda seedy and run-down, but still filled with people patronizing the paint chipped and well-loved rides. Almost post-apocalyptically beautiful. 

Kinda reminded Steve of Las Vegas, which reminded him of Billy, and now always would. 

The crowd was intense for a monday night, but it was summer after all, if the tail end of it, and kids - followed by their bedraggled parents - ran fro ride to ride to arcade to food cart screaming and laughing in a way that made Steve particularly smiley. 

“What?” Billy aksed him when he caught Steve staring, grinning stupid. 

“Nothing.”

Billy raised an eyebrow.

“Really, nothing. Literally nothing. I’m just, you know, happy.”

Billy smiled too, just nt in Steve’s direction. 

“Yeah, me too.”

Billy let Max pick the one ride. 

She chose the roller coaster, you know, for the principle of the thing. 

It was a rickety, worn down mess and Robin was skeptical any of them would survive but they got tickets for it, and took it, and it was alright.

“Frankly, we’re lucky to be alive.”

“I’m aware,” was Billy’s response. 

Robin didn’t know whether to feel bad or laugh. 

A nice 45-minute detour at Belmont Park.

They got dinner at a taqueria. Billy’s decision. If they were doing touristy things, they may as well do this. Robin didn’t like spicy stuff, but Steve never backed down from a challenge and this was totally worth it.

They sat in plastic chairs outside the place to eat. 

“Next stop, Wendy’s house, right?” Max asked. 

Billy nodded. 

“So what’s this Wendy person’s deal?” Robin rolled the ice in her cup, still strung out the last of her soda. 

“Wendy’s like fifty, shes retired, she’s a hippie, and a cold hard bitch.”

“And you know her…?”   
“Friend of my mom’s.”

“She sounds cool.” Steve tried to move the subject away from Billy’s mom, which was appreciated. 

Billy shrugged, which was as close as anyone got to meeting his expectation of ‘cool’.

Billy made everyone wait in the car.

“What if she doesn't live here anymore?’ Steve called out the window when Billy got out..

“Then I’ll figure something out!” Billy called as he walked up to the pale pink and blue apartment complex. 

He got to the front gate and ran down the list of names. 

She was still here. 

Relief. 

Ok but was she home?

He rang the buzzer and nothing happened. But that was normal for Wendy. He rang it again, a couple of times. 

“What,” came the crackly reply. 

“Wendy? It’s Billy Hargrove-”

“I know who you are, sweetheart. Come on up.”

The box snapped at it switched off and the gate unlocked. Billy pushed through and practically ran up the stairs to Wendy’s door. 

He didn’t even have to knock.    
“Billy Hargrove.” Wendy was standing in the doorway, likely chain smoking, grey curls frizzed in the humidity. “Like I haven’t known you your whole fucking life.”

“Hi Wendy.” He hugged her, sporting his best smile. “You’ve aged horribly.”

“Not looking too good yourself, kid.” She ushered him inside, everything looked the same from when he was a kid. “Thought you were stranded in Indiana for the foreseeable future, but look at you. Just visiting?”

“Not visiting.”

She studied him.    
“Your father doesn't know you’re here.” It wasn't a question.

“Fortunately.”

“You know you can always crash here,” She waved for him to sit at the kitchen table of her cluttered apartment. 

“It’s not just me this time.”

“Got some sweetheart with you?”

“No, it’s my step-sister.”   
“Thought you hated her.”

“Not so much.”

“You know you can get in serious trouble stealing someone else’s kid.” She picked up a still steaming mug from the table in front of them, regarding him measurdly.

“I know.”

She nodded. 

What’s the kids name? Maxine. But she hates when people call her that. 

“Max. Good name for a girl.”

How long did they need? Two weeks, maybe three. They got two. 

“You drive out?”

“Drove out with some friends-”

“Bring em up. I wanna meet these so-called ‘friends’ of yours.”

Wendy threw Steve for a loop when he met her. This tiny greying woman that commanded all of them to take their shoes off and made them all sit down on an overly repaired sofa with not one, not two, but three cats.

“Introduce me.” She said to Billy, sitting down across from them and lighting a cigarette. 

To everyone’s surprise, Billy listened to her. He introduced all of them by name. 

She cut him off at the end. 

“And the redhead must be Max.”

Max got a hug. 

“I always wished my hair was red when I was young. Now its grey, so look where that got me.” She laughed to herself, total witch’s cackle.

“So, Indiana.” She started, taking a painfully long drag off her cigarette. 

“Yep.” Steve said, drumming his fingers on his knees. 

“How do you know Steve, kid?” She spoke to Billy. 

“Basketball.”

“He’s a lot nicer than you, take notes.” 

Billy laughed.

Wendy didn’t so much interrogate Robin and Steve - they were bad at being interrogated, they now knew - as she did ask them questions looking for how they answered, not what they answered with. 

She aksed Max loads. Max liked talking about herself, no ne ever asked. 

There was a break when Wendy got up to make them all tea without anyone asking.

“I thought you said she was a hippie?” Steve whispered to Billy

“Yeah her bitterness towards life is palpable.” Robin added. 

“She was a lawyer when she was younger. Joined the movement when I was a kid, it’s how she knows my mom.”

“She was a female lawyer back then? That’s so fucking cool.” Robin was leaning back to try to see into the kitchen. 

“Your mom was a hippie?”

“Kinda,” Billy shrugged. “It’s California.”

Wendy came back with tea. 

Small talk continued, and eventually they played cards, and Steve got why Billy thought Wendy was a safe bet. 

She really seemed to care about Billy.

Things like: “Wasn't it just your birthday? I know its somewhere in July.” And “No, wait, I have barbeque chips in here somewhere, you like those.”

She acted like a grandma almost, or an aunt. 

Steve wondered why she hadn't just kidnapped Billy when he was ten, but being an adult was more and more complicated wasn’t it? Billy’s dad was insane and to be hated and Wendy couldn't have been rich, even for the living alone and having cats and a million houseplants, the place was run down and disorganized, like she could live comfortably, but a kid would leave her broke. 

So she did what she could. 

And hadn’t Billy said something about her bailing him out of jail one time?

Wendy laughed at the question. 

Yes, yes she had, he’d been arrested for shoplifting from a liquor store when he was 15. It wasn't even the first time he’d been arrested, just the shoplifting was new. She picked him up, and didn’t take him home. Took him to her house and gave him dinner.

“He didn’t come around so much then. He’d come by less and less since… and he was so brooding.” She smiled, putting a hand against Billy’s unscarred cheek. 

“I’m not brooding.”

“I don’t know, you kinda are.” Steve drank more of his strangely cinnamon-y tea.

Billy flipped him off. Steve laughed

“Hey,” Wendy slapped Billy’s hand away. “Manners.”

Billy rolled his eyes. 

When Max had wiped the floor with all of them at poker, and everyone had finished their tea, Wendy gave them all directions for if and where they’d be sleeping in her house. 

The girls could have the futon in her office, ladies need their sleep. 

Robin giggled at that. 

Boys could take the living room. 

“Grab your things.”

While Max, Robin, and Steve took trips from the car to grab the night’s essentials, Wendy motioned for Billy to follow her onto her tiny balcony, just outside the kitchen.

Two chairs an empty wine bottle, and an overflowing ashtray sat under the stars. The night-dark and moonlight-shiney water was just visible between two buildings. 

“I’m glad you're back.” Wendy told him, sitting down in the chair closer to the ashtray.

“Me too.” He sat across from her. 

“You know your mother and I used to sit out here like this and talk. You remember?”

“Yeah.” Billy tensed a little. He didn’t like talking about this. 

“I’m guessing you want to know where your she is.” Wendy said as he sat down next to her. 

Billy shrugged.

“That’s not why you picked here?”

“I picked here cause I cant go anywhere else.”

“Regardless,” Wendy took a drag off her cigarette, “I would tell you, you know, if you wanted to. But I don’t know anymore.”

Billy looked up. “You don’t know where she is?”

“Last I heard, she was headed up to Santa Cruz to stay with a friend of a friend. That was over a year ago. You know, she used to call me nearly once a week. Then a month, then only when she moved. She didn’t even tell me she was going north, I heard it from the people she stayed with before that.”

Wendy looked at Billy, who was just staring forward. 

“I’m sorry, kid.” She said to him, voice rasping when she spoke more softly. 

Billy looked down at his hands.

He always felt like a kid when he saw Wendy. He felt like he was ten again, like his mom might walk in at any minute, young and happy to see him, like she’d never left.

But now he did really feel his age. Because no one in his world knew where his mother was. 

She was really and truly gone.

Billy really wished he hated his mother sometimes. 

It would make it so much easier. 

Running away with Max had been pretty easy, even if he felt, you know, attached or whatever to his dad, he hated him more than anything else- fuck him, seriously.

But even now, he wished his mom would come back. 

He knew he shouldn’t, though. 

So that helped. 

“I like your friends.” Wendy said to him.

“Yeah?”

She nodded. “You had the worst taste in people. I remember the kids you hung out with in high school - you graduated didn't you?”

“Yeah, I did.”

“Good going.”

“Thanks.”   
“And I like your step-sister. She really looks up to you”

“God, I hope not.”

Wendy laughed.

They kept talking. 

And Billy felt like maybe, eventually, he wouldn't need to hate his mom, and wouldn’t need to miss her either. Maybe he could be a real person eventually, without any adults, not even Wendy, to feel like judge, jury, or exicutioner. 

What was that big word Robin had used earlier talking about California history?

Sovereignty.


	11. Untitled (Love)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So untitled (love) by Keith Haring might not actually have been released yet in 1985, but I couldn't get a straight answer from the internet so you know, just pretend.  
Also baby went a little off the rails in this chapter words wise I had a lot of gay pining hours.  
I'm calling myself baby because my sister said I wasn't allowed to refer to myself as daddy in the third person anymore. Fascism. anyway I loooove yoooou  
\- gogo

Wendy came back in from the balcony, followed by Billy to announce she was going to bed. 

“You kids in for the night?” She asked Billy. As if he were in charge. 

Robin looked at Steve, who usually got kind of pissy when he wasn't in charge. She made a face at him. He made one back.

“We can be,” was Billy’s response to Wendy. 

“It’s not late, you should show them around somewhere,” she told him, picking up one of the three cats.

“Max shouldn’t-”

“Leave the kid, do something, have fun. You need fun in your life that isn't illegal or life threatening,” she half mumbled. “I’m going to bed, don’t touch my tequila.” She pointed sternly at Billy. 

“C’mon Wendy-”

“Don’t you ‘c’mon’ me, young man. I’ve known you since before you could walk. And remember the rule!”

After she’d disappear down the short hall into her room, Steve turned to Billy. 

“What’s the rule?”

“No fucking in her house.”

Steve looked alarmed. “Does she-”

“No idea. She probably thinks one of us has a thing going with dear sweet Robin.”

“Disgusting,” was Robin’s response, not looking up from her book. 

“You wish, Buckley. I’m way outta your league.”

Robin set her book down. “Need I repeat myself?”

“You need not.” He smiled at her, saccharine. 

“So are we going anywhere?” Steve carefully pushed another cat off his lap and onto the couch where it looked at him judgmentally.

Billy shrugged.

“Where’s San Diego’s Castro?” Robin asked, petting the third cat between the ears- cats loved Robin.

“The Castro is in San Francisco, Buckley-”   
“I know that. But it’s, you know,  _ that _ part of SF.”

“The gay part?”

“Every city in the world has a gay part. Where’s it here?”

Billy didn’t say anything at first. “...Hillcrest.”

“How far is it?”

Billy shrugged. “Fifteen minutes.”

“Take us to Hillcrest!”

“I’ve never been.”

“Why?” Steve asked. 

“Because I wouldn’t want people asking me why I was in fucking  _ Hillcrest _ .”

“We could go now.”

“There’s no parking-”   
“I’m down. We could take a taxi.” Steve stood up. 

“Yeah!” Robin grabbed his arm. 

Robin started whisper chanting ‘Hill-crest! Hill-crest!’ knowing if she started chanting anything Steve would join her. He did.

“Fine.” Billy got up.

Before they left, he leaned into Wendy’s office to check on Max. She was sitting on the floor, marking things with a pencil in her Player’s Handbook. 

“Hey, we were gonna go out.”

“Ok. Why’re you telling me?”

Billy shrugged. “Just in case you wanted me to like, stay, or something.”

Max smiled a little. “I’m good. Wendy doesn't seem like an axe murderer, and I’m tired from the beach anyway.”

“Cool.”

“Thanks for asking.”

“Yeah.” Billy maybe got sort of self conscious of the fact that he autopilot asked Max what she wanted him to do, but he’d have to get past that. This was gonna be it. Just the two of them. 

What a stressful and exciting thing.

“Have fun.” Max said, maybe trying to get him to leave, maybe teasing him. 

He left.

They took a cab to just outside where the ‘main drag’ started. Didn’t want it to be too obvious. Walking through Hillcrest was a trip. It wasn't particularly busy, but the smattering of groups of people they saw were even more obvious than Robin could have ever hoped for. Like, really and truly other gay people. Other gay  _ adults.  _ Walking around like it was nothing to be gay and be standing. 

“I’m home. I’m meant to be here. This is a utopia.” She grabbed Steve’s arm. “This is unbelievable.”

“Unbelievable...” Steve was looking around, brow furrowed, a mixture of excitement and nervousness. Robin realized he might not have been so wholly confronted with this kind of thing,  _ their _ kind of thing before. She often forgot it wasn't a singular realization, but an ongoing event that Steve had been late to. When had he first figured it out? Shit, last year?

“You ok?”

“Yeah,” He looked at her, a bit of a deer in the headlights. Albeit, a tall and athletic deer, but a deer nothless. “It’s just, surreal.”

She nodded. She squeezed his hand briefly.

She counted rainbow flags. 

“...nine, ten, eleven, my god,  _ twelve… _ ”

Billy made them stop out in front of a corner store, with a ‘stay here a sec.’

Steve and Robin were content to keep up their novel observations, leaning up against a concrete wall, smoothed by the paint of a faded and vandalized mural. 

“Robin?”

“Yes, my liege?”   
Steve cracked a smile. “Did you get that from Dustin?”

“Nope! Got it from school, King Steve.”

“Oh god, no. Let’s not relive that.”

Robin laughed. 

“I have a serious question.” He started.

“Go for it.”

“Do you, you know, like Billy?”

It was Robin’s turn to smile. “I know you like him.”

“But I trust your opinion.”

“Even if he is an ass, which he is, he has his moments. I get it, if that’s what you mean.”

Steve nodded. “Cool.”

“He is an asshole though.”   
“Yeah, I know.” Steve sounded a little curt.

“Oh my god you were so mean to me about Tammy you can’t even-”

“I was not! I was honest. Observations only-”

Billy reappeared from the corner store, pack of Marlboros in hand. 

“Aren't you supposed to-” Steve started.

“Don’t tell Max.” Billy cut him off, taking Steve’s lighter out of his jacket pocket - he remembered where Steve kept it - to light one for himself and handing Steve the rest of the pack. 

“Why would I-”   
“Don’t.” Billy pointed at him, not looking back, walking ahead of him. 

“See?” Robin murmured to Steve.

Steve smiled a little. “Yeah, I see.”

They stopped naturally in front of a white wraparound building with big black letters reading “The Center” with a pink triangle. 

_ ‘The Lesbian and Gay Men’s Community Center.’ _

“Keith Haring.” Robin pointed at a poster taped to the checked outside window. Two blocky red figures, a heart motif. 

“Who is…?” Steve looked at Robin.

“Keith Haring is this artist guy in New York. He does like,  _ awareness _ stuff.”

“So is it like just a community center?” Steve asked.

“Just for us.” Robin bobbed on her heels. 

“It’s also like, a clinic I think.” Billy exhaled smoke. 

“How do you know all this stuff about Hillcrest if you’ve never been?” Robin asked him.

“How do know who Keith Haring is?” He shot back.

It was the habit of committing everything you heard about gay activity to memory.

When people talked about you, didn’t you pay attention?

“We should find a bar!” Robin urged. 

Steve flipped his hair out of his face for the third time. “We’re all underage.” 

“Surely at least one of these places wouldn't care.”

“No one’s gonna be out, it’s a weekday.” Billy was just flicking his cigarette butt from his hand. Steve stopped to put it out with a sneaker. “And there’s less and less people even  _ around _ Hillcrest.”

“We could find a lesbian bar.” Robin was not giving up easy.

“Yeah you could complete your quest.” Steve said helpfully. 

“‘Quest’?”’ Billy echoed, mockingly.

“The whole reason she wanted to come out here was to kiss a girl. Cause- wait, you’ve never kissed anyone, right Robin?”

Billy laughed. “I’ve kissed more girls than Robin ‘The Dyke’ Buckley.”

“I hate you both.”

“Oh, what? Don’t lump me in with him.” Steve chased after her a bit when she started walking away from them. “Robin, come back I love you.”

“We’ll find you a girl to kiss, Buckley!” Billy called after them, altering his pace not at all. 

“Fuck off!” She yelled back.   
  


They found a hole-in-the-wall shop with sort of everything alt-y. Way more hair dye than the place in Kansas City, records and tapes, posters, a display case labeled ‘glassware’ that was obviously just bongs, a bucket full of pins of band Steve had never heard of. And a tiny rainbow flag behind the glass of the front door. 

“I need to live here,” Robin half-whispered to Steve. “This is amazing.”

“You said.” Steve tried unsuccessfully to duck under a ceiling-hung display of windchimes and set the thing off a little. 

“Try not to damage the displays, please,” came a voice. 

All three of them looked around to see a blue-haired twink with maybe a million piercings, sat behind a high counter, looking at them over a copy of  _ Rolling Stone.  _

“My bad.” Steve said back. 

The twink smiled, rolling his eyes, returning to the magazine. 

“Great, you’ve already made us look bad in front of another gay person,” Robin whispered to Steve. 

“Hey, woah, ‘us’? I don’t know you two.” Billy smiled, pushing past Robin to get to a shelf of tapes.

“He’d probably know where we could go.” Steve said to Robin, “If you did want to find a bar.”

“You make me sound so uncool.”

“I thought you didn’t care about being cool, Buckley?” Billy was dragging his hand over the ridges of each cassette tape case. 

Robin made a face at him before turning her gaze back to the twink behind the counter. 

He might actually know where they could go. Did she have the balls to ask?   
Robin grabbed one of the pink triangle pins from the bin she stood next to and walked up to the counter. 

The twink put his magazine down. 

“Hi.” Robin said bouncily.

“Hi,” The twink said back, equally bouncy, smiling, a little amused. 

“I’m Robin.” Robin stuck out her hand.

“Well it’s very nice to meet you Robin,” The twink shook it. “I’m Sebastian.”

“Sebastian,” Robin looked very reasonable. “I’m gonna cut to the chase. Where can an underage dyke get a drink around here?”

Sebastian laughed, exposing a tongue piercing. “I know a couple places, but I can’t say your friends will have much fun.”

Robin looked over her shoulder at Billy and Steve half-arguing over the quality of a Bruce Springteen album.

“They can just talk to each other.”

Sebastian gave Robin directions to a place a couple blocks down, and she thanked him. He waved a knowing “byeeee” to the three of them on their way out of the shop. 

Robin had a decently good sense of direction. 

Steve had some thoughts and feelings about the destination and company of the evening, none of which were negative, but all of which were just a lot for him to process. 

Surprisingly though, lesbian bars were just bars. With lesbians in them. And better decor, actually. 

And none of the said lesbians gave him any weird looks, just smiles if looks at all. Just, unaware of men.

Steve was also actually aware that him being in here and them ignoing it was probably because they saw him, then Billy, and  _ assumed _ they were gay. 

How did Steve feel about that?   
I mean, kinda fine. 

Fine?   
Yeah. Pretty much fine. 

“You know we shouldn't actually drink,” Steve was saying when they walked in.

“I know,” Robin rolled her eyes at him “Wendy’s like, my new favorite person.”

“Yeah she’d also fucking kill me if I dragged you all back drunk.” Billy 

Eventually they all agreed one drink was fine, but nothing more than that. 

Robin immediately ran for the bar, leaving Steve and Billy alone at the edge of the crowd. 

Steve was warming up to this, easing into the feeling of  _ this _ being normal at obvious. 

He looked at Billy and, oh of course, he looked fine. Why was he so frustratingly self-possessed? Like nothing could shake him, and Steve knew that wasn't true, lots of things could, but he never looked like it. Even in a literal lesbian bar he looked unbothered, beer in hand, leaning agasite the photo-covered wall. 

“What.” Billy caught Steve’s gaze. 

“You look cool.”

Billy snorted. 

Steve might have said something else, but lo and behold, someone tapped his shoulder. Imagine a bar where people are so polite as to tap your shoulder to get your attention. 

Steve turned around. 

“I love your hair!” A young woman with an equally coiffed head and a pink suit jacket yelled over the music to Steve.

“Thanks! I like yours too!” And he did like her hair. It was almost a skunk look, treated like a fauxhawk, bleached white. Cool. 

She smiled and introduced herself. They shook hands. 

“We’re just here for a friend,” Steve was pointing in Robin’s direction, where she stood getting a second drink from the bar. 

“This your boyfriend?” The woman asked him, and Steve hesitated for a second, before Billy reached across to introduce himself. As Steve’s boyfriend. Which was maybe the best thing to ever happen. 

The first woman was there with friend too, also a girl, far more feminine, with a heart sticker on her cheek. And Steve was surprised by how easy conversation was with total strangers when the only thing you knew about each other was that you all went to the same kind of bar for the same reason. 

“...yeah it’s the Farrah Fawcett spray! No, yeah, it works way better than you’d think…” Billy could hear Steve saying to Pink Jacket. Lesbians loved Steve, apparently. Might just be cause he was easy to talk to.

“It’s nice to still see guys out and about, too.” Heart Sticker said to Billy. 

“Nice to be out.” He said, smiling a little. He knew what she meant. 

Heart Sticker was still in high school, but Pink Jacket, who was her girlfriend, was in college. They were both from San Diego. Heart Sticker knew a decent amount about cars it turned out, so her and Billy talked about that for a while, which was fun- Steve didn’t know jack shit about cars. 

Robin showed back up, having been in a serious political conversation with the bartender, was immediately introduced to Pink Jacket by an enthused Steve, and everyone started trying to scope Robin out a girl. 

They found one.

This one girl with a nose ring and dyed black hair who kept glancing Robin’s way. 

She was wearing a Clash t-shirt.

Faced with the prospect of actually talking to a girl, who was confimed as a fellow homosexual, was more daunting in practice than she’d anticipated. 

“Just go!”

“Steve-”

“Robin, listen, you’re pretty, you're smart, and you stopped the world from ending one time. Just say hi.”

“I can’t-”

“Fine, I’ll talk to her.” Steve pushed past her

“No-!”

Steve had already waved the girl down, was already walking over to her. She looked surprised, then she smiled. Steve said something and pointed at Robin. 

Robin felt her pulse fast-track.

Billy pushed her in the girl’s direction. 

“I’m an amazing wingman.” Was the first thing Steve said to Billy when he walked back over. The girls they’d met had since left for the dancefloor.

Billy laughed at him.

“Really! I am. One time? I got a girl’s number for Tommy H. in like, ten seconds.”

“Very impressive.” Billy said, no real inflection, just to see Steve smile more. 

“Thank you, I know.”

_ You have how many hours left? _

That was not a useful thought at all, but it kept coming up in Steve’s brain while he and Billy talked, just talked. Like  _ god this is incredible, I missed this, I missed us,  _ but it would be over tomorrow. Over over. No ambiguity or anything, just like, you're there, i’m here, and we’re so far away. It doesn't matter. We’re too far away. 

And maybe that was fine. Steve knew it wasn't the perfect relationship. It was… chaotic. Up and down and kind of crazed at times. They did used to fight, like, all the time. And it was a toll all on its own to not be a  _ normal  _ relationship. Steve didn’t always get what he needed out of it. The kind of no holds barred that he gave up, the devotion he always felt. Like he could feel Billy holding something back, not giving everything up, why would you? It was a dumb high school relatioship and a social anomoly and Steve was trying to stop being so ride-or-die-

“Hey.” 

Steve turned to Billy from silently looking out over the dancefloor. 

“I got you something.” Billy smiled a little as he said it, smug.

“What?”

Billy held out a keychain, his finger hooked through the ring of it so it swung a little, catching the light. One of those mini California license plate keychains that you could get your name on. This one said ‘Steve’ in the dark blue letters. 

“Oh my god,” Steve laughed, taking it.

“You like?”

“When did you get this?”

“When I got smokes earlier.”

“Did you pay for it? What with, you know, your history of shoplifting-”

“If you don't like it-”   
“No,” Steve pulled out his keys to attach the thing. “I love it.”

This was worse. Billy had done stuff like this before, but it’d always been made out to be casual. There was always space between them when they were together. Maybe the secrets they kept from each other, from everyone. Maybe fear, or guilt, or whatever. 

Now there was nothing. Like, no secrets, no fear, no guilt, no space, nothing. 

This might be better than before. Which might be close to perfect. 

Exactly what Steve needed. 

It made leaving worse. 

_ I’m keeping this keychain until I fucking die. _

Billy knew he was not a great boyfriend. Even when he dated girls, and it was just boxes to check off of ‘things you do when you're in a relationship’ he wasn't good at being particularly affectionate or considerate. 

But Steve made him want to try. Like, actually try. 

But at the same time, Steve made doing all those things easy. Billy was primed to look for things Steve woudl like, kinds of junk food, songs on the radio, dumb trinkets like the keychain. He’d gotten better at ‘what’s up?’s and ‘how was your day’s, because even once or twice was more than never. 

He hadn't done it enough before, he knew that. He’d been holding back, not giving everything up. He didn’t know any other way. 

But if dying taught him anything, it was that there wasn't a ‘way.’ A person just had to do things and hope that was the thing to do. 

So he’d try to do better. 

Steve made doing better easy. 

_ He’s leaving tomorrow.  _

Don’t think about that.

_ This was more serious than before, wasn't it?  _

Even in a literal gay bar, it took a bit for the two of them to sit comfortbaly. It wasn't like there were any other guys around, and it wasn't like they knew anyone there, but only after ages of small talk, were they sitting how they always wanted to sit and just never did. They had grabbed a corner booth, and could sit touching, which honestly wasn't that big of a deal, not that big of a physical change, but it meant the world to both of them. To sit together. 

Maybe that’s why the conversation got more genuine. 

“Talk to me.” Steve said when Billy rapidly changed the subject away from July. 

“About what?”

“About how you are. With, you know, everything that happened.”

Steve waited

“...It’s like, you know how people say you only live once?”

“Yeah.” Steve knew.   
“Well this might be like, one life, with just a minute break in it. But it doesn't feel like that. It feels like, two lives, one before, one after, and I don’t know how they, you know, meet up.”

Steve nodded a little, following to the best of his ability.

“If I really did die, which, you know, I did,” Billy paused, staring at his hands “Who am I now? Who’s walking around and running away to California with Max, and talking to you?”

“That’s a, uh, rhetorical question?”

Billy rolled his eyes.

“Because I mean, you’re a pretty unmistakable person.”

“It’s different now, Steve.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

“Yes. I do. Everything’s different now. Time goes on, and all that.”

Billy gave him a look. 

“And It’ll be different tomorrow.”

There that was. The fact that it was almost tomorrow, and tomorrow would be different, because tomorrow they wouldn't be together. 

There was a pause, not uncomfortable, just each waiting for the other to speak.

“When I thought, you know,” 

_ That you were dead.  _

Steve wasn't looking at him. Billy didn’t know why. Steve kept going. “I guess I just, really knew how I felt. And I didn’t want to feel that way.”

“What, like, you were still pissed?”

“No…” Steve looked at his hands. “Like… I loved you. I didn’t want you to be dead, I didn’t want it to be over. You know you've royally pissed me off before and I got over it, or you made up for it, but if you were dead… that was it.”

A pause, then,

“Seemed unfair. That’s why I didn’t go to see you in the hospital. I was kinda, mixed-up i guess. And i didnt think you wanted to see me.”

“I thought about you literally every day I was in there.”

Steve smiled a little.

“I couldn't have done this without you.”

Steve felt the words like the warm shower from earlier that day. Like the endlessly comforting and completing thing it was. 

_ I couldn’t have done this without you. _

This. Them, here, in a bar in San Diego, California. Being alive, being in love, 

_ he couldn't have done it without me. _

He needs you, that’s what he’s saying. 

And that’s just what Steve needed to hear. That he was needed. 

He smiled. 

God, this was so much better than before. 

They went back to talking easy. 

“I just realized I have no idea where Robin is.” Steve leaned back a little, looking over the crowd.

“She’s probably fine.”

“But shouldn't we go?”

“Probably.”

Steve dragged Billy around to look for Robin, was unsuccessful, and the two of them just posted by the exit to see if she was on her way out when she came grinning like crazy, stumbling over to them, 

“Robin! We were wondering-”

Robin grabbed Steve’s hand and dragged him outside into the cool night air. Billy followed. The music from inside was muffled but the glow of it was still felt.

“I kissed a girl.” Robin grinned, bright eyed. 

“You what?” Steve’s mouth dropped open.   
“I kissed a girl!!!” Robin practically screamed. “I did it! I  _ kissed _ a  _ girl _ !”   
“You did!” Steve grabbed her arm. 

“I’m gay!” She grabbed his shoulders.   
“I know!”

“Oh, my god Steve!” She threw her arms around his neck, he almost fell over.

“The girl chatting you up at the bar?”

“Yeah!”

“What’s her name?”

“Sherry or Shirley or- or Joan. I don’t remember!”

“That’s amazing. How was it?”

“Amazing. Incredible. Fantastic. Life-changing.” Robin kept spouting synonyms. “Totally rad. Mind-blowing. I’m gay!”   
“You are!”

Robin was laughing like nothing else, giddy with understanding, high on her own discovery, pulling Steve in circles on the sidewalk, still radiating warmth from the California sun, long set over the ocean. 

“What happened?”

“She was asking me where I was from, and I was talking about Indiana, and she asked me if I’d ever kissed a girl and I was like ‘man, I’ve never kissed anyone’ and she was like, well you could kiss me and we made out for like, an entire minute!”

“Good for you.”

“Wait, I should have stayed, shouldn’t I?” Robin stopped Steve.

“Probably.” He laughed

“Should I go back in?” She spun all the way around. “Steve, I’m so overwhelmed.”

“I know.”

“Stay out here, Buckley, we’ll get you home.” Billy ushered her down the sidewalk. 

“I feel amazing,” Robin whispered to him. 

“I know what you mean,” he whispered back, far less drunk, understanding completely.

They got a cab, Steve paid for it. 

They all tried desperately to act laid back, uninvolved, until the cabby asked them about the bar they’d just been in and said she was a regular. Dropping every facade immediately, the four of them talked easily in the way only other queers could, about anything in a way that meant everything. 

Robin thanked the cabby a million times when she dropped them, ending it with an ‘I love you’ that she returned. 

Robin, coming down off a ridiculous amount of adrenaline opted to turn in, but they all hung out in the bathroom to brush their teeth and stuff, not wanting to end whispered conversation. 

After Robin said goodnight to the boys and disappeared into wendy's office, Steve was about to pick conversation back up when Billy stopped him.

“Do you wanna go make out in your car for a bit?”

“Oh, yeah. Yes. Let’s do that.”

You’ll never see anything more joy-inducing than two teenagers running down a flight of stairs, dragging each other by the hand, trying not to laugh in California twilight. Because as on onlooker, you know what they’re doing, how they feel, by the way their shadows overlap, the laughter they try to subdue. 

Steve slammed his car door just a little too loud, diving into the backseat, which set him on edge but Billy just laughed at him. 

And they did make out, just not for very long because it was the middle of the night and they had started the day tired anyway. 

A lot of the time in the back of the car was spent in total silence, Billy leaned up back against Steve’s chest, Steve with arms around his waist his shoulder. 

Steve liked this feeling, of being part way crushed by Billy weight, of listening to him breathe, of feeling his heartbeat. 

Billy liked it too. Maybe he was finally in a place where he could admit to all the things he liked about being with Steve.

“Thank you.”

“For what? The sex?” Steve pushed his hair out of his face only to have it fall forward again. “Because, you know, you’re welcome.”

“No. Well, yeah,” Billy laughed a little. “Also for driving Max and me out here.”

Steve smiled. 

“I never thanked you.” Billy kept going. “So, yeah.”

“‘Course.”

“You make a lot of, you know, big sacrifices for other people.” Billy felt the weight of it pressing on him, he felt, right then, how heavy it could be not to love, but to be loved. To understand that someone else would do quite literally anything for you. Dedicated part of themselves for you. When had he ever done that for Steve?

“I dunno, doesn’t feel like a sacrifice What else would I be doing?”

“Yeah.”

More perfect silence. 

“I’m gonna miss you.”

“I’m trying not to think about that.”

“Hey, you know, like you said,” Steve tried to lighten the mood. “Plenty of fish in the sea.”

“I said bitches.”

“I didn’t want-”

“Commit to it, Harrington.”

“Fuck you.” Steve smiled. 

“I’ve got some good news for you-” Billy started, Steve pushed his shoulder. 

_ God, I love you.  _

_ What would I do without you? _

  
  



	12. What I'd Do Without You

The sun rose in San Diego, California, three hours after Indiana. It dragged behind, lazy, laid back, and broke over the mountains. Billy woke up to it, alone in that moment of daybreak, Steve still asleep on his arm. They had ended up covering the floor in the amassed blankets and pillows Wnedy had given them, just to sleep next to one another again. It was a little obvious, but it was the middle of the night for one night. The second night in a row. 

Billy had slept over at Steve’s house more and more before, when they were still together in Hawkins. They hadn't really talked about it, it just kept happening, and they didn’t want it to stop. Billy had watched dozens of sunrises like this, Steve still asleep beside him. 

He watched the yellow and orange and pink of this one paint Steve’s skin, spill over his features, his white t-shirt blue in its shadowed folds. Billy felt the cold flush of a California morning, the kind of cool that promises heat in just a few hours. And after that… after that, Steve and Robin were going back to Hawkins. It would take them less time, probably, to go back. 

A very old and well worn sadness took over Billy’s head for a minute. 

He couldn’t seem to hang on to people, could he?

Not his mom. Not Steve. Someone was always leaving. 

Steve stirred. Billy watched the thin scar under his lower lip stretch as he yawned.

“I can't sleep if you’re staring at me.” Steve mumbled, pushing over to press his shoulder against Billy’s chest. 

“Can’t help it.” Billy smiled a little.

Steve, practically buried under makeshift bedding, reached one arm out to reach for Billy, settling a hand against his jaw. 

“You ok?”

Billy didn’t say anything at first.

“Not really, no,” He said finally. When is it better to say what you want then when you say goodbye?

Steve pushed himself up on his elbows, hair still a mess, and turned to Billy. 

“Tell me about it, stud.”

Billy laughed out loud. “Have you been waiting to say that?”

“Yes, yes I have.” Steve laughed once and yawned again. “What, don’t you like  _ Grease _ ?”

“Sure, I do.”

“What’s wrong?” Steve asked more gently.

This was the moment for Billy to say something about not wanting Steve to leave. This was it, he could say something, like, you know ‘don’t leave yet’ or ‘come back’ or suggest, fucking, long distance. But that didn't work. That never worked. 

He just had to let Steve go. 

It wasn't like he was a great boyfriend anyway, Steve deserved better, in the long run. 

But jesus, Billy wanted to be that better boyfriend. He used to hate how Steve made him feel like he should want to be a better person. But now… it was like a thing he could actually try to do- was trying to do. Because he wanted to. 

Couldn't he be better?

Probably not. 

_ What’s wrong? _

“I’m just gonna miss you.” Was Billy’s response.

Fuck. That meant this really was it. Robin and Steve would be leaving in like, a couple hours. They had to say goodbye in two hours. 

A goodbye like forever. Like this was it, that was it. 

_ Bye. _

Pretty cool we got to fall in love in a shit-kicker Indiana town and have a really awesome secret romance and learn about ourselves and grow as people in profound, inarticulable ways. Anyway, have a nice life.

Did that have to be it? Couldn’t Steve ask to stay longer, or come back, or even do long distance, which never worked, but what if it worked? 

Steve was probably supposed to want more than this. Or something. Or supposed to actually go and marry some girl and have the whole, life plan of kids and a car with her, the faceless unnamed girl. He could do that. He’d be happy. 

But it might not be like this. 

It might not be this kind of happy, with someone who actually understood you, someone who knew you and still loved you, someone who really honestly gave Steve the things he needed- to feel like a person, who needed things like compliments and encouragement and support. Not always direct, usually backhanded, but it was there. Unmistakably. 

_ “You’re fucking, King Steve. You can do anything.” _

Steve didn’t want that to be over. 

And it was, and then it wasn’t. It might have been better than before, that one day they got, but it might be idealized instead. 

Did it have to be over?

Probably. 

_ What could you say? _

“I love you,” Billy whispered. 

He’d said it before. He’d said it in Vegas. He’d said it last night. He wished he could just say it over and over and over until maybe eventually he would have said it enough times for Steve to understand how his heart was about to break.

Steve looked at him and smiled. “Love you, too.”

Billy wrapped his arms around Steve, pulling him down, rolling on top of him, just to hold him, just to feel Steve’s chest rattle with a small laugh, just to feel their skin pressed together, just to breathe his smell. 

He might never get to again. 

This was goodbye.

Wendy made them all breakfast. Steve and Billy knew well enough to re-create space between them before anyone else woke up. As if they could ease out of this by being friends before strangers. 

It was better, you know, a clean break or whatever. And no one had died, which was cool. 

They took the boxes of stuff out of Steve’s car and moved them to Wedny’s living room, who sat on the couch, drinking balck coffee, to direct them.

Then they packed Robin and Steve’s stuff back into the car. The car that had got the four of them here from Hawkins. 

It seemed almost empty now. 

Steve and Robin thanked Wendy a million times, who waved them off with a ‘don't mention it.”

Max cried again and gave Steve overly specific instructions for what to say to who when he got back, some of which he wrote down because he couldn't remember it all. 

Robin almost cried, Billy made fun of her, and she shot back a: “Never in my life will I cry for a man.” which made him laugh.

Max and Robin said their goodbyes a bit away from Steve and Billy.

Steve wished they could touch in some way. They definitely couldn't kiss, they couldn't do anything really. 

It’s hard not to constantly touch someone you've known past all boundaries - it seems unnatural. As if they should always been in earshot, always be in sight, and if in reach, always touching. 

“I really am sorry about your birthday card,” was all Steve could think of to say. 

He had no idea how deep that hurt Billy to hear, because of course that’s what Steve Harrington would be thinking about, not abut how sad he was, not about his own heartbreak, but abut Billy’s. 

“I don’t care,” Billy smiled a little.

This might be the hardest thing he’d ever done, he realized. Even fighting the Mindflayer, he  _ had _ to do that. Life or death. 

This was just part of being alive. 

Steve nodded a couple times, blinking too fast. 

Steve wouldn't cry because he always kept it together for other people, he was always the strong one, but Billy didn’t want him to have to do that.

He never wanted him to have to do that. 

Steve had always made Billy feel ways he wasn't sure he could anymore. Like, gentler, nicer feelings. One of those feelings was this: he wanted to take care of Steve, in a really sort of protective and tender way that defied what Billy thought to be his nature. 

He didn’t really know what to do with it.

So he hugged Steve.

He never really hugged anyone like that, so assuredly. 

Steve wrapped both his arms up across Billy’s shoulders, ever so slightly taller, dug his fingertips in. And they stayed like that longer than boys were supposed to. But Billy wasn't sure Steve could bring himself to let go. 

Even when he started pulling back, Steve’s hands followed Billy’s shoulders, his forearms, slid through his hands. 

“Bye.”

Steve smiled. What else was he supposed to do?   
“Bye.”

When Steve got in the car Billy started walking back to the apartments. 

“Not gonna watch them go?” Max aksed him.

“Nope.”

She nodded, starting to follow. 

But he stopped when they got to the stairs.

“Max?”

“Yeah?”   
“I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks.”

They stood looking at each other, Max squinting up at him in the even California sunlight they’d almost forgotten until now. 

“What?” He said to her.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re giving me a look- what’s the look.”

“Just, you know,” Max shrugged. “I like Steve. You like Steve.”

“I know.” Billy said back, kind of defensive. 

“So… we’re just gonna stand here while they drive away?”

“I’m making adult decisions-”

“You’ve been an adult for less than a month.”

“But you’ve been a little shit all your life-”

“He’s leaving.” Max cut billy off, pointing to the car, pulling out of it’s spot.

“Shit.”

Steve felt every passing second like a rock in his stomach. Like he could feel time dragging by. He could think, how many seconds had it been since he’d touched Billy’s skin? How many hours would go by?

And would he ever get to do it again?

Because now he was turning away, getting into the car, Robin getting in beside him, and Billy and Max were walking off back towards the apartments, and pretty soon he’d be so far away-

Farther than ever, maybe. 

“Steve, are you crying?” Robin touched his arm. 

“What? No.” Steve wiped his eyes on his sleeve. 

“Steve, it’s ok if you're crying.”

“Thank you but I’m really not.” Steve lied as a tear ran all the way down his face.

“Oh, little Stevie.” Robin leaned across the middle of the front seat and hugged him as hard as she could. Steve could have sworn she was trying to squeeze the two halves of his heart back together. 

“Thanks, Robin.” 

“I love you, dingus.” She said, muffled by his shoulder.

“Yeah, I love you, too.”

Steve started the car. 

He had no idea how he was supposed to drive all the way back to Indiana, all the way back from this fucing beautiful place, from one of the people he loved most in the world, back to Hawkins. And just. Stay there. Stay in nowhere with nothing but Robin and a handful of kids. 

But that wasn't nothing, was it?

That was something. 

He had them. 

He could get a job, hopefully, if the rumors had blown over by then. 

He could save up for moving whenever Robin moved, they had talked about that. About leaving together. And going… somewhere. Back here, maybe, in a year, Robin always talked about San Francisco. Or to the east coast. Or to London, Robin had said once, wildly speculating. 

And maybe this was a good ending. 

Maybe it was good that the thing he’d built with Billy ended like this, before they started to hate each other again. 

Steve knew how to do this, how to get his heart broke and keep going. It wasn't like Billy had really-

Speak of the fucking devil. 

Billy had just run back down the sidewalk, and out in front of Steve’s car. Steve was barely moving, so it was easy to stop, Billy even put his hands down on the hood. 

Steve was already in park, already getting out of the car.

“You know that’s the second time I’ve hit you with my car-”

Billy kissed him, right there on the sidewalk in San Diego sunshine. Steve let himself be pushed back against the driver’s side of his car. Thank god no one was around. 

“Come back,” Billy said when he pulled back. 

“What?” Steve smiled, bewildered. 

“Come back. I’ll get a place, and a job, and you can come, and- and stay with Max and me, hell, bring Robin, just, please come back.”

“I-” Steve tried. 

“Swear to god I’ll do whatever you want. I won’t so much as  _ look _ at anyone else. Just promise you’ll come back.”

“Yeah, I- I can do that.”

“Yeah? Cause you know, people say they will, and they don’t-”

“I will. I mean it.”

Steve nodded, smiling so hard it hurt.

“I love you so fucking much.” Billy murmured, pressing their foreheads together. “I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life.”

Steve couldn’t think of anything to say. This was it. This was the thing he’d always wanted to hear: That someone cared about him as much as he cared about them. That it wasn't one sided, it was both of them.

He was really, and truly, not alone. 

He couldn’t ever remember a feeling quite like this. 

Just, endlessly hopeful. 

Billy was going to wait for him, he wanted to. 

They could figure out a plan. 

The didn’t have to say goodbye like goodbye was forever. 

Goodbye was just a year.

Less than a year.

And couldn't they come out and visit? Sure they could. 

You don’t think that’s stupid? Long distance never works, you know. 

It’s easy when it’s what you want.

“I was thinking of going to school in Cali anyway.” Robin leaned out of the car next to them. “If i’m allowed to interrupt.”

“You really got him?” Max called from just down the sidewalk, walking over. “Thought maybe it was too late.”

Yeah, the four of them could work out a plan. 

-

It took less time to get back to Hawkins. 

Maybe it just felt like it. 

Steve thought maybe he wouldn't be able to drive back. Like, maybe his limbs would just not respond, his body overthrowing his brain to keep him there in California, keep him near Billy, refusing to drag them away from each other. 

But he could still drive, and drive away. 

“We’re gonna come back.” Robin reminded him

“Yeah,” Steve never spoke this softly. “I know.”

He felt it all backwards, like waking up. But maybe like falling asleep. 

The coast to the mountains to the desert to the plains to farmland to Hawkins.

Reminding yourself what it was like to be free, to be anticipating freedom, to be in love, to be falling, to being alone, to being trapped. Because if you reminded yourself that you could feel things like love and freedom, being trapped and alone wasn’t so bad. 

They did the drive in two days. 

And it hurt to be so far away, but what was that thing people said about the thread that connects people?

Steve wanted to be completely left alone when he got to Hawkins. He wanted to hide in his room and never resurface. Just stay there, like, hibernating or something until he got to see Billy again. Become a hermit.

“You can’t become a hermit,” Robin was telling him as they dragged Steve’s stuff up to his house. They’d gone there first, likely because they were both trying to drag out the sense of freedom for as long as possible. This backfired. 

Steve’s parents were home. 

Which was a completely jarring and terrible realisation when Steve first heard his mom calling to him from the dining room and he realized that it was over. The trip was over. 

And wasn’t he happy to be back? His mom gushed, over doing it, not prying, but not un-suspicious either. 

Guilty until proven innocent. 

Steve might have been almost too despondent to defend himself in the little social ways, but 

Robin wasn't. Robin wasn’t going to let him flail. She grabbed his hand, smiled at his mom, then at Steve’s dad when he walked in, said they had just such a great time, she really had a better idea of school for next year, thanks to Steve.

“I’m glad you enjoyed yourselves.” 

“Thanks, Mrs. Harrington.”

Could Robin stay for dinner?

“We never sit down to dinner.” Steve mumbled. 

But yes! Robin could stay, let her just drop her stuff off back home.

“You don’t have to-” Steve started when they got back to the car. 

“You would do the same thing, if I asked.” She said. “Imagine if my parents thought something was up. You’d go full boyfriend mode at the drop of a hat.”

He smiled a little. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Well I  _ know _ .”

He smiled wider at that. 

Robin hugged him. 

Robin hugged him a lot on and after that trip. Maybe she could feel Steve tense and offset by the lack of physical affection. It was like he was going sober cold turkey, he was jumpy and distracted and sad. Just sad. So she hugged him as much as she remembered to, or linked an arm through his, or pulled his head onto her shoulder, scrunched her fingers through his hair. 

Steve liked it, it was nice to feel someone else caring about him. 

But it was Robin’s brand of affection. It was lighter, gentler. 

She had long, thin fingers when she ran them through his hair. Her hugs were tight, and she meant them, they just weren't broad and warm. 

Or not  _ as _ warm. 

Billy always ran hot. 

Robin smelled like vanilla and the dust that collected in record sleeves, not like leather or cigarettes or sweat. 

When she aksed him how he was, her voice was higher, more musical. And it was nice, it really was. 

It just wasn't the right voice. 

Steve wished every time that it was Billy. Hugging him, touching him, asking him: 

_ “Hey, you ok?” _

He played Billy’s phrases over and over in his head, just to remember his voice better, only to forget things and worry maybe this meant Billy was getting away from him, maybe he didn’t mean back what he said in Pacific Beach, maybe-

Then he’d get the phone call he waited for at the end of every day. 

And he’d remember the right kind of hands, and touches, and temperature, and smell and taste, and he wouldn't have to remember the voice because there it was, asking him how he was, and every time he’d answer the same:

“I miss you.”

And every time he’d hear:

“I miss you, too.”

_ When can I see you again? _

Literally back in Hawkins a day and Mrs. Sinclair had already called Steve asking if he could still watch the kids because of the Sinclair’s monthly date night had matched up with their turn to host game night.

The kids were ecstatic to see Steve again. 

He got tackled getting out of his car.It was mostly just by Dustin, but you know, team effort to drag him inside.

They all played it pretty cool until the adults left.

No sooner had the door closed behind Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair than Steve got millions of questions:

“How was California?”

“How’s Max?”

“Do people talk weird?”

“You were in Vegas Max said! What was that like?”

“Is it true they have a shark tank at sea world? Did you see it?”

“You went through Utah and didn't see Suzie??”   
“California’s cool. Max is fine, she misses you guys, told me to relay some nerd stuff, people don’t talk that diffrent, Vegas is cool when you’re an adult, no we didn’t see the shark tank, and Dustin, Utah is really fucking big.”

“Do you miss Billy?” That was El’s question. 

Stee didn’t know how to respond right away. 

“I’d miss Mike if he went to California.” El added, wondering if Steve just didn’t know what she meant.

“Uh, yeah.” Steve cleared his throat a little. “Yeah, I do.”

“I feel your pain, man,” was Lucas’s solemn response. 

Steve actually laughed. 

“What?”

“Lucas, you’re fourteen.”

“You’re eighteen! Love is love, man.”

“Where is Mike, anyway?” Steve sat up, mood lightened. 

“Mrs. Wheeler’s still pretty freaked.”

“We told everyone you’re with Robin but she still doesn't want Mike hanging out with us. So he’s sneaking out after dinner.”

“Oh my god I’m gonna get fucking arrested,” Steve said almost to himself. “You know sometimes you actually have to obey rules? I could get in really big trouble”   
“Hypocrite!”

Steve really tried to be functional, just get back up, keep going. 

If he did that, he’d get back to Billy sooner. 

When had they said they’d meet? Next month. Halfway point. Cool, ok.

Being functional was hard, though.

Especially when everytime he woke up for the next week, in the split second half asleep haze, his brain told him he was still in California, or back in Las Vegas, or somewhere else, just anywhere else, and he would reach out an arm to find nothing and no one in colder, greyer, Indiana daylight. 

God, this was awful. 

But it wouldn’t last forever.

Robin took him on a date. 

A week after they got back, people had generally calmed down, and enough people had seen them out job hunting together to let it go. 

Not everyone though. 

So, Robin took him on a date.

Steve was feeling particularly sorry for himself watching Miami Vice and eating chips when the doorbell rang. Every time the doorbell rang Steve found himself hoping it was Billy come back again, or maybe never having left. Maybe he would answer the door and it would be Billy with long hair and no scars, asking if he wanted to sneak out and get drunk and get frosties or makeout or something. 

But Billy never rang the doorbell. He always knocked. 

Or broke in through Steve’s window. 

Steve pulled open the door to find robin.

Robin in a dress.

“What are you  _ wearing- _ ”

“We’re going on a date. Get your keys.”

“What?”   
“We’re going on a fake date! Make eveyone shut the fuck up. You’re taking me to get pizza downtown and then we’re going to see Teen Wolf.” She pushed past him.

“We already saw Teen Wolf-”   
“But you liked it so we’re seeing it again.” Robin grabbed his wallet and keys from the coffee table and threw his jacket at him.

“Why?”

“Because when you’re sad it makes me sad and this is at least a productive activity.” She grabbed his arm, started dragging him outside.

“It’s been less than a week, I can’t just stop being sad.”

Robin let herself into his car, tossed him the keys. “Get in the car, Harrington!”

“Fine, fine.”

So they got dinner, caught a movie. 

Robin held his hand as they walked around, pulling him closer when she spoke. They ran into people they knew, curse of a small town, and to everyone in Hawkins they were the picturesque couple. 

So eventually people stopped prying at Steve Harrington’s private life. 

  
  


Billy had to keep reminding himself that he didn’t cry ever. Mostly because he’d cried more in the past couple of months than he ever had in maybe his entire life. 

And he didn’t cry, mostly because Max cried a little, and he sat with her to keep the fragile sense of stability they were creating. 

But he didn’t really need to cry either. He felt, you know, mostly ok. 

Because even while Steve was farther and farther away for real, it didn’t feel too much like it. 

It felt more… real. 

It was kind of insane what Billy did, catching up with the car, proposing long distance. But it made it so instantly  _ real _ . Nobody did that when they were not serious as hell about it. And it wasn't like it hadn't ever been not serious, they just used to pretend it wasn't. 

Way back in the beginning, when winter was thawing into spring, they pretended it wasn't happening, then that it wasn't serious, then that it was just for fun, laughable maybe.

But it happened, was still happening, was serious and fun, but it was like, you know, that once in a lifetime, maybe. Maybe not, but still, didn’t it feel like it?   
Billy really honestly didn’t know what he’d be doing without Steve in his life, even if it had to be from a distance. 

Billy always thought he’d have to keep going with girls, even after he got away from his dad. He thought it would be safer, him alone, going for stability, the long con. But maybe because of the nature of his escape, maybe because Max knew, maybe because Max made him want to be a better, more whole person, maybe because Steve, even at a distance, was a promise he meant to keep, he stopped going after girls on purpose. They still flocked to him, he was still an incorrigible flirt, just it really didn’t mean anything. It was like a protective buffer, knowing that about himself, answering to no one. As long as he was playing it safe, nothing could touch him. 

Closer and closer to freedom. 

Billy was with Max twenty four seven for the rest of the summer. Just the two of them, sometimes Wendy, even after they moved out. 

Anything they did, they did together. 

So Max picked up on the absolute pining that was going on.

“I miss him, too.”

A phone call from a late August evening:

“Harrington residence-”

“You always sound so stupid when you answer the phone.” Billy’s voice cut him off, oddly gentle.    
“Hi. Hey.” Steve leaned up against the wall by the phone. 

“Hey.”

Neither spoke for a few seconds.

“I miss you.” Steve maybe shouldn’t have said that, it made him heartbroken all over again. Maybe he should have lead with the superficial ‘how are you’ or a more veiled ‘it’s good to hear from you’ but he couldn't. They weren’t like that.

“I miss you, too.” It was beautiful and terrible to hear. 

Steve cleared his throat. “How are you?”

“Fine. Looking at a place with Max tomorrow.”

“That’s- That’s great.”

“How’s Hawkins?”

“Your favorite town?”

“Answer the question.”

“It’s fine. The whole, rumor thing blew over a bit. Everyone thinks Robin and I are a thing again.”

“That’s good.”

“I mean, I can get a job, which is good. But I don’t, you know, feel good.”

“...I’m sorry.”   
“It’s not your fault.”

“Not yours either.”

“How’s your new job, anyway?”   
“Minimum wage-y.”

Steve laughed a little.

“I’m glad you called.”

“Yeah, me too.”

_ When can I see you again? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmk if I had u going for a second there, like I'd let them break up. Like they'd let me break them up. Next chapter is the epilogue so get ready for that going up tomorrow. It's almost over lads. Thanks so much for coming with me on this two month journey.  
All my love,  
Gogo


	13. After

So maybe no couple has enough time. Because for all the time you spend together, you’ll always have to spend time apart. And maybe you’ll run out of time, or maybe you’ll get sick of each other, and everybody’s gotta die eventually. 

All odds are against you, you know?

Long distance never works. 

Because absence doesn't make the heart grow fonder, it’s more like out of sight, out of mind. You get lonely and your sex drive gets crushed and you might fight more than anything else and the way you’re far away enough to watch your love die out hurts worse than dying.   
But there’s something so wonderful about the handful of time you do get to spend together, the long phone calls with no fighting, the souveniers, reminders, knick knacks sent by mail, the plans for short trips to visit, the days you really do get to see each other, which are once a month at most, few and far between, but wonderful. So wonderful. 

It really could be worth it. 

It won’t last forever. Everybody's gotta die. 

But it’s lasted this long. 

It’ll last a bit longer. 

No use thinking about how much time you might have or not have.

There’s just right now. 

Which is how Steve and Billy got themselves through an entire year of long distance. 

Which is ‘such bullshit’ and ‘the literal worst’ but also ‘so totally worth it’ if that’s really what you want.

Which it was.

Billy got a job, two eventually, but after three weeks (Wendy caved and gave them extra time) at the one they had a month’s rent for the world’s shittiest apartment. 

Hopefully they’d get a better one. 

When Billy and Max finally brought all two of their boxes of stuff up to their new and tiny apartment and closed the door behind them, that’s when they first felt really and truly ok. 

Exhausted from the California heat and three flights of stairs, they laid for a bit on the cheap carpeted floor, catching their breath.

“Decide which room you want?”

“Yep.” Max pointed. “Back window.” 

There were only four rooms in the whole apartment. Two bedrooms, one bathroom, and one kitchen/living room/dining room/everything else. 

“You know, all the times I thought about getting my own place, you were never there.” Billy folded his arms across his chest. “But I’m glad you are.”

“You big softie.”

“Shut up.”

They were silent a little longer. 

“I’m glad I’m here too.” Max said eventually. “Fuck Hawkins.”   
“Yeah, fuck Hawkins.” 

They both started laughing. 

“Are you gonna bring boys here?” Max wrinkled her nose when they’d calmed again.

“Are you?”   
She pushed his arm. He pushed back.

“Ow.” 

“Oh, that did not hurt.”

“It did! It actually did!”

Billy said if it hurt so bad she should do it back so they'd be even. She did. It did not hurt.

They got takeout for dinner.

A school year goes by faster than you think it does. 

Max got enrolled in high school fine, they didn't have to lie all that much in the paperwork, but Billy got a lot of side eyes showing up at Parent Teacher nights, like who is this barely legal kid in charge of a literal child?

Nobody complained though, especially not the housewives that showed up for their own kids. Come for your child’s education, stay to stare at that Billy Hargrove, aloof, handsome, and such a good brother wasn't he? Taking care of his little system like that. 

Whatever happened to you kids parents anyway?

Car crash was the first one they came up with. Easy to believe. 

Sunk cruise ship was the next one. 

It got wilder from there. 

“They both ran away with different strippers. Tragic, I know.”

“It’s heartbreaking, but things really do go missing in the Bermuda Triangle.”

“You ever seen Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds? That.”

“That’s classified” became the default for a couple of weeks because it drove any women Billy spoke to absolutely wild. 

Max ruined it though by telling all the girls in her grade Billy was secretly married to a woman in Canada so they would stop asking Max what her brother’s ‘deal’ was. 

Max got an A+ on a math test. The best grade in her class, actually, if Billy cared. 

“Cool.”

“Usually people put good test scores on the fridge or something.”

They didn't have any magnets though. 

So Max got her first good test score of the year duct taped to the tiny half broken refrigerator that took up half of their apartment’s tiny, half broken kitchen. 

Good for her. 

_ I think I like my fake dead parents more than my real ones. _

Robin had never been to a real high school party before, so Steve found one out to drag her to even though he himself was no longer in high school. It was the only thing to do in Hawkins on Halloween anyway. 

It was good publicity for their budding relationship, quite a few gross comments were made for their benefit. Robin turned down cocaine (was he kidding? He must have been kidding, right? No, there’s probably actually coke somewhere). Steve turned down a keg stand opportunity (I thought you were good at those or something? Well I've had several concussions so I'm not sure it’s a great idea). 

Robin decided she hated high school parties in the first twenty minutes and they ended up bailing to watch horror movies in Steve’s basement. 

Robin fell asleep halfway into the fourth one though (The Exorcist) and Steve took the opportunity to make a phone call. 

_ Hey, remember we met on Halloween? _

Billy got a new car. 

Well, new to him. A used, half-broke and un-glamorous car, but it worked. 

Most decisions Billy made started being based on stability for Max’s sake. 

She skated to school most days, but if he got off work in time he gave her rides home.

Wendy invited Billy and Max over for Thanksgiving, and having nothing better to do, they went. It might have been really nice because it gave the illusion of family, but not quite. 

That was one of the weeks Billy wasn't sure him and Steve were gonna make it. 

Which is probably why that weekend he impulse drove out to meet Steve at a motel halfway between them for two days where they spent totals of two hours fighting, five having sex, and the other forty one hours sleeping, eating, or talking, just talking, just relishing the time to be togather again. 

There were a few close calls like that. 

But that’s all they were: close calls. False alarms. Flukes, miscommunications, doubts that could easily be disproved if only you aksed:

_ Do you still want this? _

And all you’d hear was:

_ Yes _ .  _ I want this more than anything. _

_ You know I think you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me? _

_ That’s a pretty low bar, babe. _

Steve started going to the Byers’ house.

Joyce had said he should. 

He hadn't at first, he was admittedly kinda, you know, scared.

“That’s ok,” Robin was sat next to him in his car, just in the Byers’ driveway. “Just, you know, step one: get out of the car.”

“I know.”

“Do it, go, you got this.” She kept throwing out little bits of encouragement she waved her off, getting out of the car and walking up to the door. 

Will answered the door. 

“Steve.” Will smiled quickly, then leaned out more. “Hi Robin.”

“Hey.” She smiled at him. 

“Is your mom home?” Steve stepped over the threshold when Will stepped back. 

“Yeah, I can get her-”

“Will, you’re not supposed to answer the door man-” Jonathans voice called, just as Jonathan himself turned the corner out of the kitchen and stopped.

“Steve.” Jonathan looked almost alarmed

“Hey, man, how’s it going.” Steve shoved his hands in his pockets. 

“It’s uh, it’s good.” Jonathan looked from Steve to Robin but didn’t say anything else. Jonathan and Robin had only met the once, maybe he didn’t remember her name. 

“I’ll get my mom.” Will pushed past Jonathan and out of the room.

Steve and Jonathan stood with an awkwardly large amount of space between them, totally silent, staring, almost as if Robin weren't there. 

“Hey,” Jonathan took a step forward. “I’m… I’m sorry. About what Nancy said. To you.”

Steve hadn't been expecting that. 

“I told her it wasn’t, you know, nice. Of her. She should probably apologize herself, but, I mean. You know what she’s like.”

“Yeah.” Steve almost smiled. “Thanks.”

“Yeah.” Jonathan nodded once. Then left the room.

“He’s quite the charmer.” Robin reaserted her existence. 

Steve was just turning around to talk to her when Joyce walked in. 

She was happy to see them, she said so.

She hugged both of them. She brought them both to the kitchen table, where Robin had never been but Steve had been many times, and made them both tea. It reminded Steve of Wendy’s for a split second, and for a couple seconds after that it was harder to swallow.

It wasn't like he told Joyce everything, although he might eventually. He should probably tell someone, and it would freak his parents out if he asked for a therapist. But Joyce was nice to talk to, she didn't ask more questions than you wanted to answer and she really liked Robin.

Steve went back every weekend after that.

_ You know there’s really nothing wrong with you. I promise.  _

Billy and Max got a dog. It was more out of necessity than anything, lord knows they barely had enough money to feed the thing, but Billy didn’t like the idea of Max skating around on her own in the city while he was at work, so they went to the nearest pound and found the biggest meanest looking dog they could find. And he was a total sweetheart, not really scary at all. 

“I love him.”

“How’s he supposed to protect you? No point.”   
“We have to take him. Look at him, look at his face, he likes you.”

“Max, he’s not even looking at me. He’s looking at the fucking wall.”

“Even if he’s not actual scary he looks like it!”

“He looks dumb as shit, is what-”

The dog padded over to them, some pitbull mix, and leaned his head against the chainlink fence of the pen, right against Billy’s leg.

“He likes you.” Max repeated, slightly smug at Billy's silence. 

Billy sighed. “Fine, we’ll get- what’s his name again?”

They got the dog. 

_ I really am proud of you. _

Robin and Steve had to attend both families Christmases. 

They intended to go to California together after Robin graduated. The story they fed their parents was one of utter love and devotion to one another, and Robin would move west for school, Steve for Robin, and they would stay there for the foreseeable future. So their families wanted to get to know them.

Robin’s parents had Steve and Robin over for dinner. Steve’s parents had a cocktail party. 

Robin’s parents were too personal. Steve’s were too impersonal. The whole thing would have been horribly awkward had they been actually dating, but since they were not, it was just endlessly funny. 

They had each had to excuse themselves at different time to go into another room to pull it together, only to come back in, make eye contact, and start giggling again. 

They were eventually both excused to play board games with the party at the Wheeler house- the Wheelers had absolved Steve and the rumors surrounding his sexuality after meeting Robin and seeing how sweet and earnest they were with each other (Mrs. Wheeler’s words).

Steve kind of hated it, but loved the kids and Robin so dealt with it. 

_ Imagine if she knew. Imagine if any of them knew. I don’t know if it would be terrible of hilarious. _

“You don’t still believe in Santa do you? ‘Cause I got some real bad news.”

“How old do you think I am?”

For Christmas, Billy got Max new wheels for her board, neon ones, higher end. Special. 

She loved them. 

She got him a new earring. 

She did not pay for it. 

“You’re not supposed to do that.”

“You’re a total hypocrite.”

They got the dog a bone.

Well technically, they bought a rotisserie chicken for themselves and gave the remnants to the dog. 

‘Tis the season, right?

_ I wish we’d been together last Christmas. There’s no snow in San Diego. _

Steve and Billy had another day together- New Years. They’d grabbed three day weekends and sick days to meet halfway- every time, halfway - and it was god awful being apart, it ate them up inside, but wasn’t it wonderful being together?

Steve said he wished they could kiss at midnight. Billy could make that happen. 

They kissed at midnight, behind a bar in Kansas City that didn’t card. 

As magical as it could be. 

Which was actually pretty magical.

_ Oh god, remember our first kiss? _

Robin grew her hair out a little, recut her bangs. 

Max shaved the underside of her hair because no one was there to tell her not to. She even asked Billy what he thought. 

“If you shave your whole head I’ll do it for you.”

“I’m not gonna save my whole head.”

“Right, because you’re a pussy.”

“Fuck you.”

He helped her anyway. 

It looked super cool, all the other freshman though so.

_ I hope I’m doing this right. Raising Max, or whatever.  _

Steve was Robin’s date to prom after all. They got a limousine so she could stand up through the sun roof and yell like in the movies. 

Crazy story: Steve technically won prom king a second time. Write-in candidate. They couldn't give him the crown though, he just got a shoutout. 

_ You still think I’m a king? _

In early spring, Max asked Billy to teach her how to surf. 

She probably could have taught herself, she was only getting better at skating which translated easily, but she didn’t want to go alone. 

And they were supposed to spend time together, or whatever. 

Billy’s board was too tall for her. 

And the tide was probably too strong for a first timer that day.

But Max didn’t back down, like, ever. 

Even with water and a little bit of blood beading down her knees from one too many wipeouts. 

“Sure you don’t want a break?”

“Nope. Let’s keep going.”

Billy used to do that when he was her age, just keep going, kinda leaning into that winded feeing of coming back up after however many times you had gone under, breathing through your mouth and tasting salt and feeling your skin sting and feeling calm. Calm like nothing else. Calm for once in your life. 

“I should get you your own board.”

He told her to scoot back more on his beat up wooden one, gauge the next set of waves. 

_ I’m proud of you. _

When Robin got out of the crowd of seniors at her graduation, Steve picked her up and spun her around. It was a perfect show for their parents. She laughed and hugged him. Because it wasn't just that she was out of the hell that was high school, it wasn't just that college was around the corner, it was that in a week they’d be free. They’d get to go back to the way things were the summer before. 

They would leave, and they could come back, but they'd come back with the knowledge that they weren't stuck, they weren’t trapped. 

They were free.

_ Can’t wait to see you. _

When Steve and Robin move out to California, they’re the only ones left in Hawkins. 

The Byers’ left first. They took El, kept her and Will safe. 

The Hendersons and the Sinclairs moved to Indianapolis. Nancy left the Wheeler household to be with Jonathan, maybe permanently. Shortly after that Mike convinced the rest of the family to leave, too.

So it was just Steve and Robin for a month of anticipation, going through college paperwork, counting dollars, making calls to arrange things, packing, throwing stuff out, saying goodbye, and taking the long and epic drive out to California. Steve basically had it memorized by then. 

And they get there. 

Robin goes to college, Steve gets a better job.

They had more than a few scares, but Billy and Steve are still together, it’s way easier in California. It’s way easier when they can see each other pretty much whenever. 

They might break up eventually, who knows. 

But they’re happy right now. 

That’s what matters.

_ You made it. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AAAAAAAAA I fuckin did it this took forever and it happened and I'm alive! Fuck yeah! Thank you so much for reading to the end I love u so much wow. Two things before I go:   
One: a lot of the stuff that happens in this fic is based on events in my life! Not any of the supernatural stuff, and sadly Ive never been to Vegas, but like kegory was real. A lot of the conversations between Max and Billy are based on convos I have had with my dad. Stuff like that! which leads me to   
Two: My girlfriend is from San Diego, we met in college. We had to do long distance for a whole summer, which granted is not a year, but is a really long fucking time when you're in love. So Lucy if you're reading this, we made it! I love you <3


End file.
